


The Fall That Kills You

by Abi_A



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Eventual Relationships, Eventual Smut, GRADENCE - Freeform, Gravebone, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Obscurial Credence Barebone, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Temporary Amnesia, The Family Graves, gredence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-28
Updated: 2017-03-09
Packaged: 2018-09-20 12:06:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 23,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9490295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abi_A/pseuds/Abi_A
Summary: It’s almost impossible to cast a killing curse on yourself.(you should know)He’s heard of it being done but you have to really, really want it, and he realizes with a dull sort of surprise that he doesn’t. Perhaps No-Majs had the right idea with guns, messy and inelegant though they were. He supposes he could throw himself out of a window but he isn’t high enough.(“It’s not the fall that kills you, Percy, it’s the sudden stop at the end.”)





	1. Prologue

It’s not until the third time he fails to Disapparate that Percival is struck with complete clarity that he is going to die.

Maybe not straight away, he’s seen what Grindelwald and his followers can do. 

(and maybe not at all, because it’s amazing what a body can live through, but that’s not worth thinking about) 

In a way, he’s ready - he has been ready since the war - 

(or was it after the war? you were ready to fight certainly, ready to _kill_ , but perhaps not ready to die until you came home without - 

and after - 

but that’s not worth thinking about either)

\- but he isn’t ready to betray everything - everyone- he’s worked for. He isn’t arrogant enough to believe that Grindelwald has set up this elaborate trap just to kill him. Percival doesn’t know what it is that he knows, but he knows that Grindelwald must not be allowed to get it. 

It’s almost impossible to cast a killing curse on yourself. 

(you should know) 

He’s heard of it being done but you have to really, _really_ want it, and he realizes with a dull sort of surprise that he doesn’t. Perhaps No-Majs had the right idea with guns, messy and inelegant though they were. He supposes he could throw himself out of a window but he isn’t high enough. 

( _‘It’s not the fall that kills you, Percy, it’s the sudden stop at the end.’_

stop it. 

don’t think of him - that won’t help you.) 

It’s only a matter of time before one of them breaks his concealment charm. 

There is … one way. 

It’s risky. Very much so. And there’s a good chance that it won’t work properly and that will be a different sort of death, but at least he’ll take his secrets with him. 

(if it doesn’t work, you’ll never know anyway.)

He whispers the incantation, praying to a god he doesn’t quite believe in that he hasn’t forgotten any of it. It’s too finicky for non-verbal. He searches for an anchor, something to tether himself to - 

( _the house, the tree, the boy - why the boy? why_ that _boy?_ )

\- he drops the concealment charm himself so he can concentrate on his task. The triumphant laughter from the floor below tells him that they’ve clocked him. He only has a few seconds. 

Grindelwald enters the room flanked by his followers on either side. His smirk, ever-present, is confident at first but falters as Percival holds the wand to his own temple. 

“That’ll never work, Director”, Grindelwald says. “You have to _mean_ it.”

“Fuck you,” Percival whispers 

(what makes him think you don’t?) 

_“Obliviate!”_


	2. 10th December 1926

 

 

**Tina**

 

“Maybe it’s charmed to explode!”

“It’s clear. No spells on it,” Tina says. “Besides, if Grindelwald was going to leave a trap, wouldn’t he make it blend in a bit more?”

“So you think it was _his?_ ”

“Well,” Tina hesitates. The little stuffed bunny stares back innocently at her. “It’s probably a gift for someone.”

Abernathy picks up the toy with a pair of tongs. “Evie” he reads the name stitched into the loveheart the bunny clutches between its paws. “Graves had a dame? Who knew.”

Tina can’t tear her eyes away from it. It’s just so pink.

“It ain't surprising he had a girl,” a witch called Valerie Stroud, says. “I’m just surprised it was _that_ type of girl. Can you really see it? _Daddy_ Graves?”

“Yes,” two of the other aurors and Abernathy reply.

Tina stifles a giggle as Picquery strides into the study they’re searching. “Do I have to remind you that this is a crime scene?” she says, “I didn’t bring you here to speculate about the Director’s personal affairs. Get back to work! Goldstein, with me.”

Tina follows her out into the living room as the rest of the squad murmur apologies.

“Anything useful in there?”

“Hard to tell,” Tina says. “Graves kept notes on _everything_ \- and Grindelwald ransacked them looking for information on the Obscurial. It’s going to take weeks to sort through them.”

“I see,” Picquery’s eyes drift towards the wall that Graves had been using as an evidence board. The Director’s neat, precise handwriting pinned on so many bits of paper, linking evidence of the attacks back to the Second Salemers.

Sketches of the children cover one side of the wall, short profiles next them. Some with names crossed through.

“Credence isn’t on there,” Tina muses, “The Obscurial”.

“I noticed,” Picquery says dryly. “He’s not on the wall, because he’s in this.” She hands Tina a thick brown file. “Homework. Go through it, see if there’s anything worth knowing.”

Tina hugs the file to her chest feeling bereft and guilty. If only she could have done something to help the boy. She’d tried, but it hadn’t been enough. Too late.

“We believe Graves - our Graves - made contact with the Barebone boy after your _incident._ “ Picquery says pointedly and Tina gets the feeling that the President holds her responsible for a lot of this mess.

“You were closest to the case, go over everything and I’ll expect your report on Monday.”

Today’s Friday.

Tina’s obviously expected to work all weekend on this. Perhaps she’s being subtly punished. She suppresses the urge to sigh and roll her eyes.

“Yes, Ma’am.” She glances around the apartment again. It is the exact sort of place that she’d imagined Graves might live. Tastefully furnished in blacks and greys, the odd splash of blue. Case files and books cover almost every surface, even more in piles on the floor. Grindelwald is probably responsible for much of the clutter, but Graves has always been the sort of man who takes his work home with him.

There’s no sign of a struggle here. Everything’s as one might expect it to be. Everything except the bunny.

“Who’s Evie?” Tina asks, surprised at her own lack of candor.

Picquery’s eyes narrow. “None of our business, I should say. Why would you expect me to know? I didn’t even know he’d taken on the Second Salem case, let alone any sort of dalliance he may have been carrying out.”

“But if she’s - shouldn’t we - what if she had contact with Grindelwald?”

Picquery taps her chin thoughtfully. “If she did, she’s most likely dead.”

One of Tina’s hands flies to her throat in distress. “None of us noticed, maybe she didn’t either.”

“Goldstein, if you find anything more than a name then by all means go after her. But do it on your own time, we can’t -

She’s interrupted by the fireplace flaring to life, the floo operator’s voice flatly intones -

“This is a long distance floo call from Tristan Graves from Grosvenor Square, London . Do you accept the call?”

“His brother,” Picquery says to Tina’s questioning look. “Damn. What does he want? Yes, I’ll speak to him.”

When Tristan appears in the fireplace Tina’s struck by how much he resembles his brother. There are some differences - he’s younger, his face is softer, and rounder. His hair is cut differently, a longer, more fashionable look, but he’s greying at the temples in the same manner as the elder Graves. His eyes, hazel as opposed to dark brown, widen as he see’s who’s answered his call.

“Mr Graves?” Picquery says briskly. “I don’t believe we’ve met. You know who I am, I trust.” She pauses as the man nods bewildered. “How may I help you today?”

Tristan Graves chuckles nervously. “Well I was hoping to speak to my brother, Madam President. I - er - is he - “

“I’m afraid Director Graves is indisposed at the moment. It may be difficult for him to speak to you for some time. But I’ll make sure he contacts you as soon as he can.”

“Hang on a minute!” Tristan frowns. “What gives? He was meant to call me yesterday, and Percival would never miss a call and now the President of MACUSA is fielding his fireplace? What do you by _indisposed._ ”

“I mean indisposed,” the President says. “I’m not able to say much more - “

“Is he dead?” Even through the fire, Tina can see his face looks ashen, “Is that it?”

“Of course, not!” Picquery says immediately. “He’s simply a very busy man.”

“I know that! He’s my brother, ain’t he? This has been arranged for weeks - he wouldn’t just not show with no word no matter how busy he was. Listen lady, it was my kid’s birthday yesterday, right? And he never forgets that sort of thing, even during the war I got a letter from some trench in - “

“Evie!” Tina says loudly and suddenly, cutting off the man’s tirade.

She darts into the study and fetches the small toy.

“That’s your daughter’s name, right? Evie?”

Tristan gives her a dubious look, but he’s stopped babbling “Yeah, that’s right. Short for Yvaine, with a Y”.

“I’m sorry,” Tina doesn’t dare glance at Picquery for fear of giving herself away. “It’s all my fault. Mr Graves asked me to reschedule your call and send Evie’s present, but I must have forgotten.”

“Who’re _you_?” Tristan demands. “Why couldn’t he do it himself? Why’s his place lousy with aurors?”

“I work with him“ Tina only answers his first question, and now she does look at Picquery for help. “He’s fi - just don’t worry. He _will_ be fine.”

“Whaddya mean will be?”

Picquery sighs. “Director Graves is recovering from some injuries, that’s all,” she says. “You needn’t worry.”

“What kind of injuries? Hey! Why weren’t we told?”

“Because he asked for you not to be,” Picquery says impatiently. “It will be a few weeks before he’s discharged for duty but he will contact you as soon as he is able. If this is about your allowance - “

“My allowance?” Tristan snaps, he’s angry now, his throat going blotchy red. Tina hasn’t had much cause to see it, but the same thing happens to Graves when he’s really mad. Had it happened when Grindelwald wore his face? Why hadn’t she noticed? “Are you kidding me?”

“I apologise if I’ve caused you any offence. I meant - “

“My allowance is very generous, thanks for your concern,” He thrusts a hand through the fire. “Gimme that thing, Miss Forgetful”

“Goldstein. Tina,” Tina says as she quickly hands over the bunny. “I’m so sorry, again - “

“Yeah, yeah, tell my brother I preferred his old secretary,” Tristan says peevishly. “And tell him - I’m telling Mother!”

With that he withdraws with a huff and the fireplace goes dead.

“His allowance?” Tina says to Picquery who sighs.

“About two weeks ago Graves took two days leave of absence to settle some personal affairs,” she says. “He said that it would be Christmas soon and so his siblings were clamoring for advances in their allowance. I was given to understand, that this happened fairly often. Now that we know what we know, I think that was just something he said to discourage any further questions.”

“Is that when we think the switch took place?” Tina asks.

Picquery nods. “We know that Graves never reached his family home. According to the house elves there he never sent them any word that he intended to go in the first place. I think we can assume he was lured into a trap.”

“Two weeks,” Tina murmurs. That wasn’t long at all. Graves might even be still alive. It didn’t make her feel any less guilty. “Shouldn’t we at least tell his family?”

“Goldstein, you know the line on this,” Picquery says. “Do you know what sort of scandal it would cause if it gets out that the Director of Magical Security was replaced by Grindelwald and no-one noticed? I’d have to resign. We’d have to call another election which I would lose. It would be chaos!”

“I know,” Tina mutters, looking down at her file.

“We stick to the story,” Picquery says firmly. “Graves was injured in the fight with Grindelwald and he’s recovering. There’s no use in worrying his family until we find him.”

“Yes, Ma’am.” Tina frowns. “What’s going to happen when Tristan does tell his mother.”

“Titania Graves is on a world tour with her daughter, it’ll take him a while to hunt her down,” Picquery says. “When she hears, she descend upon us to raise hell, so we’d better find Graves, before Tristan finds her.” She taps Tina’s file. “On second thoughts you can give me that report Sunday. You can start on the file once you’ve finished up here.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

Tina’s definitely being punished.

Tina looks around the room again. “There’s no pictures anywhere,” she says, “I mean, he must care for his family, but there’s nothing here to prove they even exist.”

Picquery shrugs, “Graves was a complicated man. I think I’m only now realising just how complicated.”

“Is,” Tina corrects automatically.

“Is. Yes. Of course,” Picquery sighs. “Mercy Lewis, what a mess. What did any of us know about him really?”

What indeed.

“At least we know one thing,” Tina says. “He definitely wasn’t seeing some flapper half his age.”

 

 

**Credence**

 

The thing about dying, Credence thinks, is that he has nothing left to fear. The worst has already happened. He died, and yet there’s no fiery pit of hell that Ma has - _had_ \- always told him he was headed for.

There’s no Ma either, something he is immensely thankful for. Part of him had been afraid that he would be spending all eternity with her berating him on his misdeeds, blaming him and his impure birth and his unnatural thoughts for their predicament. That would have truly been a fate worse than death.

(( _“Hell is empty, Credence, and all the devils are here. Have you heard that one before?”_ ))

Credence shakes his head, there’s no point thinking of Mr Graves. Not after all he’d done. Not after all of his lies.

_“I thought you were my friend!”_

That was a lie as well. He’d thought they were more than that. He wasn’t sure what exactly, but the man had given him hope. He’d made Credence feel things, want things he couldn’t name and then -

Credence can feel himself start to slip into the mindless rage that had always preceded his transformations and bites down on the inside of his cheek until he tastes blood to distract himself.

That’s interesting. Even though he’s dead he can still bleed.

Credence sits down on the subway platform where he had found himself, and takes stock.

He had been ripped apart by the witches and their wands, he knows that much. They had destroyed him. There had been pain, so much pain, more than he’d ever thought possible a body could bear and then blissfully _nothing_.

But now here he is. He feels tender, not painful, but as if he’s been scoured with hot water. He looks at his hands - there’s not a mark on them. No cuts or bruises. His knuckles are always cracked and rough from the cold, but they’re as smooth as a baby’s now. This is not the place for him to check but he’s sure that it’s the same all over.

If he’s not dead - did he survive it? Or has he died and been reborn? What manner of creature is he?

_“You’re an abomination. But then again, so am I.”_

_Mr Graves lights his cigarette with a flick of his own fingers, as he speaks._

_“You don’t want one,” he says, raising his eyebrows slightly, as he sees Credence watching him. “They’ll stunt your growth.”_

_“I’m fully grown Mr Graves,” Credence says a little indignantly. “And I’m of a same height as you, I dare say.”_

_“I dare say you’re taller,” Graves says, with a slight smile. “If you stood up straight for once.”_

_As rebukes go, it’s fairly mild, but Credence shrinks further into himself. He wants so badly to please this man he adores so that even mild criticism makes him feel worthless._

_“Hey!” Mr Graves places a warm hand on his shoulder. “That’s enough. Look at me.”_

_Credence can’t. He keeps his eyes fixed on the ground until Mr Graves lifts his chin up with his other hand._

_Keeping a grip on his chin, Mr Graves takes the cigarette from his own lips and places it between Credence’s._

_“Go on, then,” he says, softly. “Breathe.”_

_Credence chokes._

_“Easy!” Mr Graves laughs and retrieves his cigarette from Credence’s mouth before Credence can drop it. He pats Credence on the back and then takes a long drag and for all that Credence couldn’t look at him before, now he can’t tear his eyes away._

_“You -” Credence says, and then stops._

_“What?” Mr Graves gives him a look as if daring him to continue and Credence merely shrugs and looks away. Mr Graves touches the back of Credence’s neck, squeezes once, and then he withdraws._

_Does he know what he’s doing? Does he know that Credence will hold on to these touches and moments tight within his heart? Does he know that Credence spends each day and night counting down the seconds until he can see him again?_

_“You won’t see me for a few days,” Mr Graves says, abruptly. “I have - there’s something I have to do.”_

_“Are you going somewhere?” Credence asks. His mouth has gone dry._

_“Yes,” he says in the final way that Credence knows not to push any further. He expects Mr Graves to ask him if he has noticed anything at the soup kitchen but instead he clears his throat and continues awkwardly. “It shouldn’t take long. I should be back by the weekend.”_

_Credence nods, unsure why Mr Graves is telling him this. “Then I’ll see you next week?”_

_“Hmm?” Mr Graves drops the remainder of his cigarette to the ground and crushes it out very deliberately with his heel. “Yes. Credence -?”_

_“Yes, Mr Graves,” he prompts when the man goes no further._

_“Never mind,” Graves shakes his head. “It’s nothing. Come on, I’ll buy you a hot dog. You look like you haven’t eaten in days.”_

_Credence wishes he could ask what’s troubling him. He wishes he could take the other man’s hands in his own, press it to his lips. He wishes -_

_He does none of these things._

_Once Mr Graves has left him he realizes that he never did ask about any of the children. Perhaps he’s come to enjoy Credence’s company for its own sake._

_Even the sting of his belt on his palms later can’t take that joy away from him._

Credence clenches his fists, as he remembers. That had been the last day he’d had a glimpse of true happiness. Mr Graves had been different after he’d returned from his trip. He’d been rougher, cruder, more impatient. There had been a _wrongness_ when he touched him.

Of course, Credence had simply thought it felt that way because of the wrongness of his desires. He’d believed Graves when he’d said that Credence was special simply because he’d wanted to.

Well, he _was_ special, wasn’t he? Even if Mr Graves had never told him so - not before _that_ day.

Before if Credence had asked him if he thought he was a freak, Mr Graves would have rolled his eyes and agreed. But then he would have grinned at him and said that he was one as well, so Credence couldn’t be all that bad.

 _You’re an abomination_ , but the way he said it always made Credence feel as if he’d just called him the most precious creature under the sun.

Credence looks down at the platform and frowns as he sees the crushed remains of cigarette butts and ash. That had been the last time he’d seen Graves smoke either.

Did it mean anything? Perhaps it meant nothing.

But Credence had _died_. What else can happen to him? He’s already been betrayed by the man who he’d … who he was…

He had loved him. There. He’s admitted it. What’s one more sin to add to all the rest? He still loves him. And if Credence’s heart has already been broken once, what’s one more heartbreak to add to all the rest?

There had been others who had been kind to him. The witch - Tina - who had tried to help him once before, who had sent Mr Graves to him. She’d tried to help Credence the night he died as well. She could help him again, couldn’t she? One last time.

He gets to his feet, and brushes dust off his clothes. “See, Mr Graves,” he whispers. “I’m standing up straight for once.”


	3. 26th November 1926

**Two weeks earlier**

 

The first thing he’s aware of when he wakes is the constant chatter. Voices washing over him and through him, not overly loud but enough to keep him from going back to sleep.

The second thing is the pain. It starts off there, but not there, gradually building until it becomes unbearable. His head is pounding, throbbing, it feels as though someone has taken a crowbar to it. Like they’ve forced it open and scraped out his brain. The voices, quiet as they are, feel like nails being driven into his forehead. Each whispered word like nails being dragged down a chalkboard.

His right arm hurts, his shoulder and wrist feel like they might be broken but he can’t move it. His ribs ache, it hurts to breathe too deeply and there are other places that feel tender and sore.

His eyelids are too heavy for him to open at first, with sleep and pain and an unnatural grogginess that he thinks must be down to some sort of sedative. He forces his right eye open, and immediately closes it as the light blinds him. His left refuses to open at all, when he prods at it lightly with his functioning hand, it’s puffy and swollen shut.

He tries again, little by little, to open his eye. He’s in a white room on a small bed - there are many others like him. Lying in their small white beds, with various bandages and plasters. He notes with some concern the tube inserted into the veins on his left wrist, his entire right arm is encased in plaster, which explains why he can’t move it at all.

He struggles to sit up and hears an exclamation that slices through him like a knife. A women in a starched white dress rushes to his side to help him sit up. There are more of them, these nurses? Is that the word? - tending to other invalids.

“You’re awake!” she’s saying. “Oh that’s wonderful! We weren’t sure if you would, you know! Dr Morton always says you can never tell with brain damage!”

“Where -?” he begins, but his throat is too dry and his voice comes out a rough croak.

The nurse clucks and helps him drink from a glass by his bedside. His throat is too sore for him to be able to drink too deeply, but he manages a few sips. The nurse helpfully, or is that unhelpfully, explains that he should expect some pain as on top of everything else he has been choked.  
  
She tells him that she will be back with the doctor and scurries off. The word “doctor” feels wrong to him. His brain supplies the word healer, but why should that feel more familiar. Surely a doctor and a healer are one and the same thing in this day and age.

What day and age? What day is it? What year?

The nurse returns with a man with a white coat and an odd tube-shaped listening device around his neck. He looks at him over his half moon shaped glasses.

“Welcome back to the land of the living,” the doctor says. “We were beginning to think you’d never wake up.”

“So they tell me,” he says, and winces as the words stab at his tender throat. He takes another sip of the water.

“Ah,” the doctor say. “So you’re American, are you? Well your case keeps getting more and more interesting.”

“My case?”

“Yes, of course. You’ve created quite a stir around these parts you know. It’s not often that we have any excitement here.”

“Where is here?”

“You shouldn’t try to talk too much,” the doctor says. “It’ll be better for your -” he taps at his own throat. “Whoever it was who did this was a nasty piece of goods. I don’t suppose you remember any of it? Just nod or shake your head.”

He shakes his head.

“I didn’t expect so. Well, I suppose we best take a look at you. Open your mouth- I shan’t ask you to say ‘aah’ but stick your tongue out, would you.”

He does as he’s told, though he feels ridiculous when the doctor pushes his tongue down with a wooden stick and peers inside.

“Hmm, yes, as expected. But it will heal. Don’t talk unless you have to, and we’ll keep you off solids for a day, I think.”

He endures the rest of the check up in silence and growing irritation as the doctor shines a light in his eyes, checks his pulse, listens to his heart with the tubular-listening device, checks his blood pressure with an even odder contraption.  
This is stupid, he thinks. There’d be no need for this charade back home. But where is home?

He allows the nurse to help him untie the hospital gown so that the doctor can prod at his injuries and tell him that he is healing, and he should try not move too much. By the time they’re done the hospital ward is beginning to swirl in and out of focus, he rests his head back down on the pillows with exhaustion.

“How’s the pain?” the doctor asks.

“Bad,” he whispers. “My head - I need to - “ he closes his eyes ‘ - just for a minute.”

“Oh, of course, old chap!” the doctor says. “Oh dear, did we wear you out? Nurse, I think we should increase his morphine -”

He’s struggles to stay awake for a few moments longer but then gives up and lets himself be dragged into unconsciousness with something like relief.

 

* * *

 

He dreams of the war

He dreams of being cold and dirty and terrified.

This war stopped being funny a long time ago, and he’s afraid - he’s really afraid - that he’s going to die tomorrow.

Sometimes he’s afraid that he’s already dead. That this is his hell, forced to fight out the same battle, over and over again. That he’s forced to live every night, shivering and hungry and nearly out of his mind with exhaustion but unable to sleep from sheer mind numbing terror. That every day he has to go over the top and watch his friends die.

Boys he’s known since he was child. Girls he’s grown up with. Those who he’s laughed with and flirted with and kissed.

He’s pulled out of his spiralling thoughts by someone taking his hand. He turns to look and it’s the boy.

 _The_ boy.

He shouldn’t be here. Can’t be here. He wasn’t even here, was he?

“Is this a dream?” he asks.

“Yes,” the boy replies. “But is it mine or yours?”

“I was here the first time,” he says. “So it must be mine.”

“Must be,” the boy smiles. “You’d better wake up then.”

The boy leans forward and kisses him on the mouth, soft and chaste. He closes his eyes and thinks about how perfect it would be if he could die here instead, in this moment.

“Not yet,” the boy murmurs, lips brushing against his. “Not yet.” The boy kisses him again, the second time just as sweet as the first, and then runs his fingers over his face, over his lips and cheeks and eyelids.

“Wake up,” the boy whispers and he opens his eyes.

 

* * *

 

When he opens his eyes there is a man by his bedside.

He doesn’t recognise the man but can’t stop the full body shudder as he takes in the white-blond hair and moustache, the eyes so pale they’re almost colourless.

The man notices his reaction and smirks as if he’s pleased.

“Hello there,” the man says. “And how are we feeling?”

He struggles to sit up up. The man watches him through hooded eyes and makes no offer or attempt to help, he notes with some relief. The thought of this man touching him fills him with revulsion.

“Do you know who I am?” the man says. He can’t quite place the man’s accent. It’s not unlike the doctor’s or the nurse’s, but there’s an undertone of something else there as well.

He shakes his head. He’s under doctor’s orders not to talk after all.

The man scoffs.

“Should I?” he asks, quietly.

“That depends, “ the man says. “Do you know who you are?”

He blinks. Considers the question. Takes a sip of water. Considers it again.

“No,” he whispers. “Who am I?”

 

* * *

 

The blond haired man tells him that he is Inspector Gresham of Scotland Yard and that he’s suppose to be over-seeing his case.

(liar)

It’s not every day they find a nameless American washed up on the beach here in Hedgecomb-on-Sea.

Does he know why he’s here? Does he know who sent him?

How does Gresham know that somebody _sent_ him?

“I don’t know my own name,” he complains. “How should I know?”

“It’s possible,” Gresham says, stroking his moustache. “The mind is a fickle thing. Who knows how much it might have retained, hmm? Think a little harder for me. What do you remember?”

He shrugs.

“Anything at all?” Gresham presses him. “Nothing?”

The nurse from before is with the doctor, gesturing towards them. Morton looks incredibly uncomfortable but at the nurses urging, he approaches.

“Matron has asked me to remind you, Inspector, that visiting hours are over,” he says with a benign smile. “I’m sure your questions will keep until tomorrow. Besides our patient needs his rest.”

“Is that so?” Gresham winks at him before turning to face the doctor. “No, I don’t think he does.”

The doctor blinks in confusion.

“No, he doesn’t. That’s right, isn’t it.”

Morton’s eyes go glassy now. “That’s right. Of course. Quite right you are. Sorry to have bothered you, old chap.”

His blood runs cold. This wasn’t just the doctor bowing to police procedure. This was something wrong. Like he’d been compelled. Bewitched.

“What was that?” he asks.

“What was what?” Gresham waves a hand. “Irritating creatures. The English more so than the rest, don’t you think. They all believe they are so proper.”

“Aren’t you English?”

Gresham smirks. “Not quite. Perhaps he was right, you do look tired. Tell me - “ the man’s pale eyes dance. “Does it hurt very badly? Are you in immense pain?”

He shrinks back against his pillows trying to put some distance between them. “What?”

“Your condition. It was not some simple mugging. It was - you must have angered the man who did this tremendously. Perhaps you stole something. Perhaps you denied him something that was rightfully his. Can you remember what it was?”

“I don’t -” He feels like he’s a mouse trapped in a cage with a serpent. But as the man’s smirk grows wider he feels a stab of anger deep within his gut.

“No I can’t,” he says, sitting up and leaning towards Gresham. “And maybe all it was, was some degenerate who believed he could just take whatever he wanted. Maybe it was just some nut who likes to hurt people.”

Gresham’s eyes harden. “Maybe,” he says. “Perhaps. Get some sleep, Mr New York. I’ll be back tomorrow. Perhaps we can jog your memory some more once you are rested.”

He forces himself to remain upright until Gresham leaves. When the man turns to look at him from the ward entrance, he even manages to raise his left arm in a wave. Gresham stares back at him with flat eyes, before lifting the brim of his hat and departing.

He slumps back as soon as Gresham’s gone. There’s a spot throbbing behind his head. He reaches around to touch it and finds a clump of his hair has been torn out by its roots. His fingers come back red with fresh blood.

Had that been there before? It had to have been? Hadn’t it?

Surely Gresham wouldn’t have… not with so many people. And what for?

He bites his lip. How does Gresham know he’s from New York?

What is it that he’s denied this man? Because it was him, wasn’t it? There’s no use pretending it wasn’t.

He has to get out of here.


	4. 11th December 1926, Part 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Did we do this, Tina? You and I? If by our presence we were the trigger for one of these children - does it make it all our fault?_

 

**Tina**

 

Five Months Earlier

 

“Sir, I’m so, so sorry,” Tina stammers. “I don’t know what came over me. That _woman_ \- I wouldn’t let her so much look after a cat I liked, let alone a child! And that poor boy, I mean she beats all those kids but she has it out for him especially. You should have seen his hands, Sir, they were all cut up and bloody and how could she do that to a - “

“Sit down, Ms Goldstein,” Graves says. He watches her from his desk, hands steepled together. “It’s Tina, right?” he says. “Do you mind if I call you Tina?”

Tina shakes her head, and sits down, wringing her hands in her lap miserably. “I know I shouldn’t have -” she starts again, but Graves holds up a hand.

“We’ll get to that,” he says. “Do you take cream and sugar?”

“Sir?”

“Coffee,” he says.  “I take it black myself.”  He beckons his fingers lazily and two cups and a coffee pot float towards his desk from the sideboard.

“Um -” Tina swallows. “Yes, please. Both.”

Graves summons both items and sends them towards Tina’s coffee mug. “Help yourself.”

“Thank you, sir.” This is easily the strangest meeting she’s ever had with Graves. Shouldn’t Graves be bawling her out right now. He hasn’t minced words before when telling her exactly how she’s messed up.

Graves waits until she’s drunk half her coffee before he speaks again.

“You always take three sugars, or is it just cause you’re nervous?”

“I - er - like it sweet, I guess,” Tina mumbles. Is he one of those people who judges others based on how bitter they like their coffee? Is this one more way she’s failed to live upto his standards.

Graves shakes his head. “That wasn’t a trick question. My sister drinks it that way too. You know her? She’s about your age. Penelope Graves. Wampus.”

Tina nods slowly. She remembers a dark-haired, pretty girl the year above her always surrounded by a gaggle of friends.

“We weren’t really in the same circles.”

“No, you wouldn’t be,” he smiles briefly. “You know, you remind me of her. She’s a lot like you - fiesty - is that condescending? - what I mean is she’s very determined. If she gets an idea into her head then come hell or highwater she’s going to run with it. And very much like you -” his voice hardens “- she doesn’t listen to a damned word I say.”

There it is.

Tina looks down at her hands. “I really am sorry.”

“Yeah, so am I. Because unlike my sister, I can and _will_ fire you -”

“No!” Tina’s on her feet. “Please, Mr Graves -”

“Sit. Down.” Graves says and sighs. “Don’t make this any worse than it has to be, Tina.”

“But, sir -”

“You know what frustrates me? You’d be one of the best aurors I have if you could just stop fucking up.” Tina flinches at the curse.

“Sorry,” Graves says, not sounding apologetic at all. “The Second Salem job was supposed to be keeping you out of trouble. It was meant to be your last chance. Did you think surveillance meant you could just shit all over the Statute of Secrecy? Is that it, Tina? You can’t just hex No-Majs. I get it, okay? That woman is a nightmare, but we don’t get involved in No-Maj affairs.”

“But if you’d only seen him -”

“Tina, you know there are ways to intervene in extreme circumstances, none of which involve the need for thirty two No-Maj Obliviations.” He groans, pinching the bridge of his nose with his finger and thumb. “My god, the paperwork. I’m going to be here all weekend.”

“You don’t have to do my paperwork, Sir. I should be the one to give up my weekend. I can do it by myself.”

“No, you won’t. You’re no longer an auror.”

Tina’s knees buckle and she drops back into her chair like a stone. “Oh.” She looks at Graves, her mouth open in shock. “But -”

She can’t hold the tears back, and the embarrassment of openly crying in Graves’ office only makes them fall harder.

“Aw, fuck,” Graves says, looking so alarmed that Tina might have thought it funny in another circumstance.

“I’m sorry,” Tina sniffs and dabs at her face with her sleeve.

Graves sighs and comes around to her side of the desk. He perches on the end of it next to her chair and gives her a handkerchief.

“Okay, that’s on me. I should have phrased it better,” he says gently. “I _am_ on your side, Tina. You just haven’t left me many options.”

He pats her shoulder gingerly. Tina looks up at him through her wet lashes. She supposes he’s trying to be comforting, but he has just taken away the job she loves. She blows her nose in his handkerchief a bit louder and more vigorously than needed.

Graves winces. “You can keep that, by the way. Look, here’s what I can do. I can give you a desk job somewhere - they always need people in the Wand Permit office, right? You do six months, without any incidents - keep your nose clean - er - figuratively, and I’ll reinstate you.”

“Six months?” Tina isn’t sure whether to be relieved or disappointed.

Graves nods. “You’re gonna hate it, I know. They don’t call it purgatory for nothing. But do your time, show me that you can _listen,_ and you’re back on the force. Does that seem like something you can do?”

“I don’t have much a choice,” Tina says. “I’m not ungrateful, Sir!” She adds quickly as Graves frowns. “I just - if you’d just go and see them. At that church. The way they live. I’m not asking you to reduce my sentence! I’ll do my time - but maybe you could help them.”

“Reduce your sentence?” Graves scoffs. “Mother of god, it’s the Wand Permit Office! Anyone would think I was sending you to the Death Pool.”

“Sorry, Sir,” Tina says. “But if you’d -”

“If you apologise one more time, I really will fire you,” Graves mutters. “Fine. I’ll go check on the Barebone woman and her kids, okay. As long as you stay away from them. Understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Tina beams at him. “Thank you, sir.”

Graves waves her off. “Go on. Get out of here before I change my mind,” he says. “And no more trouble. If I have to see you again before your six months are up, I really will send you to the execution chamber.”

 

 

Midnight, Saturday, 11 December 1926.

 

The first note is dated the day after Tina had been demoted. Graves writes his notes like he’s a thirteen year old girl scribbling in her diary, full of abbreviations and personal observations. Odd symbols are used liberally, some seem to denote some sort of shorthand, but it’s becoming clear that Graves has a doodling habit and that some of the squiggles are simply squiggles.

_Went to the 2nd Slmr. Meeting near nm b._

_Mlbb worse than I thought. High poss scr._ _Inv._ _No wonder tg went all hw. Must be getting soft in my old age letting her get to me. Why do they always cry in my office?_

“Imagine the editing he has to do before he files them,” Tina says to Queenie. “No wonder he was always so mad about extra paperwork.”

Queenie yawns as she peers over her shoulder. “Oh that’s pretty good,” she says. “Did he draw that?”

There’s a sketch of the bank partway down the page, the figures have no discernable features but there’s one that’s obviously Mary Lou proselytising, waving her bible at the gathered crowd. Her children mill around her, attempting to hand out flyers. Tina’s eyes are drawn to the central figure, in his too tight suit and bowl cut hair, his face angled so that it seems as if he’s looking directly at the artist.

 

* * *

 

The second entry, dated two days later has a full sketch of Credence, holding out a flyer.

_Could have sworn I cast a nmn. Getting old?_

_He came straight up to me and gave me one of their damned flyers. TG was right, his hands were cut up, saw me looking and tried to hide them. Ran away before I could say anything._

Tina has to look away to compose herself. The ink-and-paper Credence looks up at her, eyes imploring, yet resigned. He seems to be reaching out for help, even though he already knows that none will be coming.

_With rainy eyes he writes sorrow on the bosom of the earth._

 

* * *

The next entry is three pages of profanity. Much of it about her own person. The rest is devoted to the incompetence of the Oblivators' department.

Tina's face flushes red as she reads some of Graves' choice expletives.

In between the curses, she gathers that Credence had walked up to Graves and asked if he was "one of those witches like Miss Tina". He'd remembered the incident even as everyone else in his family had forgotten.  


_How fucking hard is it to fucking Obliviate one fucking No-Maj?_ Graves rages. _Are they all blind as well as shit eating cock monkeys?_  


Tellingly, despite all the vitriol spilled over the pages, he says nothing about Obliviating Credence himself.

 

* * *

 

Entry four is a single word in capitals, underlined twice, with such force that the quill has torn through the paper.  


** SQUIB **

 

* * *

 

Graves calms down over the next entries. Reasons with himself that an informant within the church would be useful. If the boy is a squib then he isn't really doing anything wrong.  
  
He meets the boy once a week for the next month. Heals his wounds. Buys him hot dogs and ice cream.  
  
_I don't like to watch him eat,_ Graves writes _. He eats like he’s starving. Like he never knows when he might get the chance again. I don’t like to think about how that’s probably true._  
  
_Sometimes he looks at me in the same way._  


* * *

 

The Obscurus attacks begin and Graves is quick to tie them to the Second Salem church.  
  
The attacks destroy places that they've been, places they’ve been ridiculed, where they've been turned away from.  
  
Graves' notes turn clinical, more investigatory.  
  
Tina can see the beginnings of the evidence wall in his apartment..  
  
He talks less of Credence now, the pages filling up with Obscurus research, letters from experts from around the globe. One she notes with a pang of longing is Newt's brother, Theseus who calls Graves "Percy" and says things like "What ho!" in his letters, something Tina hadn't believed that anyone ever said outside a farcical novel.  
  
Theseus talks a lot about people they knew in the war. "Do you remember Tuppers? Jammy git's only got himself elected to the Int. Fed. So watch out for him next time. Merlin, isn't that a joke? Who would have thought old Tuppy would end up so respectable?"  
  
And then at the end: “I do miss them all terribly, especially -” Tina can't read the name, the paper is burnt through, like Graves has stubbed it out with one of his cigarettes. “He was the best and the brightest of us all.”  
  
_Damn you, Theo._ Graves writes on the back of the letter. _Damn you to hell and back._  


* * *

 

Tina visibly jumps when she see her own name.

_Did we do this, Tina? You and I? If by our presence we were the trigger for one of these children - does it make it all our fault?_

 

* * *

For the last two months Graves stops writing about Credence and starts to draw him again. Compulsively. Some might say obsessively.  
  
In between his case notes, and letters and research he draws Credence over and over again. Some of the pictures are dated. Most are not.  
  
Credence stands huddled in alleyways, he sits in a pew in church hunched over his bible, he walks through the streets and avenues handing out his flyers and pamphlets, a picture of abject misery. There are some where he's drawn looking out pensively over the river. There are others where he looks out of the page eagerly, his eyes bright with greeting. A few rare half-smiles, of him almost looking cheerful. And there’s one where he’s happy, leaving the frame, with a smile full of promise and hope and an almost coy look in his eyes, like he has a secret that thrills him, and he doesn’t care who knows. It makes Tina feel uncomfortable like she's eavesdropping on a private conversation.  
  
Graves fills page after page of sketches off Credence's hands alone. Cut and torn and bloody and sometimes healed and whole.  
  
There's a page with nothing but the boy's eyes. Another with just his lips.  
  
Tina turns the pages quickly, the sight of Credence’s parted mouth, lips dry and chapped somehow more intimate than if Graves had drawn him naked.

 

* * *

 

Dawn is rising by the time she comes to the end of the file.

The last drawing is a moody charcoal piece. Credence stands in the middle of a storm. His face is upturned to face the dark tumultus clouds, rain pouring down on him like benediction.

“Look at this,” Tina says to Queenie as she emerges yawning from her bedroom. “Do you think he knew that Credence was the Obscurial all the time?”

“Oh, Teeny,” Queenie looks around in horror at the scattered drawings. “Is that what you’re taking away from all this? Did you go to sleep at all?”

“No,” Tina says. “I don’t think -  “ she tugs at her collar uncomfortably.

“That they were lovers?” Queenie says blithely reading her thoughts. “Maybe not, Teen, but you can’t say that _this_ was normal. I’ll put some coffee on.”

“It would explain why he was so angry,” Tina says.

“How terrible,” Queenie says. “Do you think Graves is still alive?”

“I hope so,” Tina says. “On second thoughts maybe not if I have to admit I read his - obsession file.”

Queenie sighs. “What happens when he finds out the kid is dead?”

“I’d rather not think about that, right now” Tina says. She takes the mug Queenie hands her and closes her eyes as she takes a long sip. “We have to find him first. You should -”

Queenie shrieks and drops her mug splattering Tina’s legs with hot coffee. Tina goes for her wand, pushing her sister to the side as she rushes back into the main room of the apartment.

Credence Barebone is standing in their apartment. He leans over the table eyeing Graves’ pictures of him curiously.

“Where is he?” he says. His skin ripples with the bubbling energy trapped within it. “Where is Percival Graves?”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Er... Graves ended up more obsessed than I originally thought he would be. Oh, well.
> 
> In my head, Theseus is like a competent version of Bertie Wooster.


	5. 11th December 1926, Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Credence wonders what would have happened if he’d turned around. What would he have seen? If he had turned to look at him would he have been able to tell that Percival loved him just as much as he did. 
> 
> Because it _is_ love, isn’t it? 
> 
> It has to be.

 

**Credence**

 

Four months earlier

 

“Do wizards believe in God, Mr Graves?”

Mr Graves shrugs in reply. “I can’t speak for all wizards. Some do. Some don’t.”

“Do you?”

Mr Graves lights another cigarette directly from the one he’s almost finished before he says anything. “Does it matter to you if I do?”

Credence turns away from him. It’s easier to talk when he isn’t looking straight into those eyes. “I don’t know,” he admits.

“I don’t know either,” Mr Graves says and Credence can _feel_ the man looking at him. “Which isn’t an answer, but that’s not what you’re asking, is it? You’re asking: if what you’ve always believed about witches and wizards is untrue, what about the rest of it?”

“Ma says it’s a sin to doubt,” Credence whispers. He glances at Mr Graves over his shoulder. “She says it’s a sign of weakness. She says it’ll let the devil in.”

Mr Graves bares his teeth in a smile that looks more like a grimace. “Do you think I’m the devil, Credence?”

“No,” Credence says quickly. “No, of course not.”

“Are you afraid I’m here to tempt you away from the path of righteousness?” Mr Graves says sharply. “Get you to renounce your witch burning ways? Though, I’ll be honest with you Credence, I always thought that not setting other human beings on fire was a good thing.”

Credence looks down miserably. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles. “I didn’t mean to -”

“Didn’t mean to _what_?” Mr Graves says.

Credence has the urge to take his belt off and hand it over. Not that he thinks Mr Graves would ever strike him, but he doesn’t know how else to make amends.

“I’ve offended you,” he says.

“No, you haven’t,” Mr Graves says. “Oh, come on, Credence. I was only kidding. Hey -”.

He takes Credence by the shoulders and peers into his face. “Now I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you - no, that’s not true. I did mean it.”

Credence blinks at him in surprise. He’s unused to people apologising to him, even less so admitting they’re the ones in the wrong. “Mr Graves?”

“It’s been a long day,” Mr Graves says. “I’ve been -  in the line of work I’m in people expect me to know all the answers. You’ve said nothing wrong, I’m just in bad mood and I was being unkind. Forgive me.”

Credence could forgive this man anything. He can’t speak, because the words won’t come, but he looks up at Mr Graves’ face - are all wizards this beautiful or just him - and nods.  

Mr Graves cups Credence’s cheek and _oh_ no one has touched him that way in a long time. Not since he was very small and Ma still made the effort to pretend that she loved him. He’s leaning into it before he can stop himself, practically nuzzling Mr Graves palm and -

“ _Damn,”_ Mr Graves laughs shakily, pats Credence’s cheek and removes his hand. Credence feels lonelier than ever at the loss of contact.

“Jesus,” Mr Graves mutters. “Maybe I was wrong. Maybe _I’m_ the sinner, and you’ve been sent to tempt me. Ever think of it that way, Credence?”

“Me?” It’s so absurd that Credence forgets to be nervous. “What could I possibly tempt you with, Mr Graves?”

“What indeed?” Mr Graves, gives him a wry, perhaps even fond smile. Or is that only Credence’s wishful thinking? “You have no idea what you are.”

“What - what am I?”

“You’re an abomination,” Mr Graves says, and Credence’s heart sinks, “But then again, so am I.”

“You’re no such thing!” Credence blurts out.

Mr Graves gives him that same wry smile. “Sure, I am. But you’re one too, so it can’t be all bad.”

He’s teasing him again. As if they really were friends. Credence feels warm all over at the thought.

“You know, Mr Graves,” Credence says, oddly bold. “Sometimes you don’t make a lot of sense.”

He’s half expecting Mr Graves to snap at him, or to scold him for talking back, but instead he just laughs and taps Credence on the forehead.  

“And you don’t make any sense at all, kid. I’ll see you next time.”

He vanishes with a loud crack that Credence will never get used to. He takes a minute to collect himself and then heads back home, holding Mr Graves’ parting words tight in his heart.

 _Next time._  

 

11th December 1926

 

“I don’t look like that,” Credence says to no one in particular.

He’s sat at the Goldstein’s dining table his hands wrapped around a mug of hot coffee he’s yet to take a sip of.

He doesn’t think he can eat or drink anything ever again, but the warmth of the mug is soothing, it helps to ground him to his body.

Tina exchanges a glance with her sister and Queenie shakes her head. “Sorry Teen, I can’t get anything from him. It’s just buzzing. Like a wasps nest.”

Credence frowns. “It’s not polite to try and read my mind,” he says.

“I know,” Queenie says. “I don’t mean to usually, but you’re a special case, honey.”

Credence looks down at the table, and runs his fingers lightly over a picture of his own face. Credence doesn’t have much cause to look into mirrors. Ma has - _had -_ always said that they led to vanity, and he avoids them as much as he can anyway. He’s always thought of himself as ugly, the haircut doesn’t help, but Mr Graves has made him look … beautiful isn’t quite right word. _Desirable._

Credence has never believed anyone would want to look twice at him, but the boy in the pictures is someone you could spend hours admiring.

“He isn’t dead,” he says. “He can’t be.”

Credence would know, wouldn’t he? Surely the world would have stopped spinning if Mr Graves were no longer in it.

But then, Mr Graves had been replaced. He had been kidnapped, or injured, or worse and Credence hadn’t known.

How could he have not known.

“There’s a good chance he might still be alive,” Tina says gently. “For the potion to work, the original has to be alive, and it’s only been two weeks.”

“He said he was going somewhere,” Credence says quietly. “I don’t think he wanted to go. He never _said_ \- that he - if he - I would have - “

Tina lays a hand over his clenched ones.

“It’s okay,” she says. “Just stay calm, okay?  It’s gonna be okay. We’ll find him.”

“Why didn’t he say anything?” Credence asks her.

“If you’ve looked into as many minds as I have, it’s because they’re afraid the other person doesn’t feel the same way,” Queenie says. “You never said anything to _him,_ right?”

“Maybe he just liked to draw you,” Tina says half-heartedly.

“You don’t believe that for one second, Teenie,” her sister says. “Let’s be honest.”

Tina gives her a _look._

“You can ask him when we find him,” Tina says. “But we have to find him first.”

“Can’t you make the evil wizard tell you?” Credence asks.

“They’re working on it,” Tina says, giving Queenie another one of those looks. “But Credence, maybe _you_ can help us. Did Graves say anything about where he was going?”

“No,” Credence says miserably. “He just said he had something to do.”

“Anything else? Anything at all - “

“Mr Graves didn’t talk about his work with me,” Credence says. “Just about the Obscurial - about _me_ , I guess. Am I really the only one this old?”

“How old are you?” Tina asks.

“I’ll be twenty four on my next birthday,” Credence says. He looks back at the drawings so he doesn’t have to meet the eyes of either sister.

“And when is your next birthday?” Tina probes.

Credence squirms uncomfortably. “Two weeks.”

“Is your birthday Christmas day?” Queenie says. 

Credence shrugs. “I guess.”

Queenie gives him a sympathetic smile. “I guess it always gets lost among all the madness, huh?”

“I don’t think it’d make any difference either way, Miss Queenie” Credence says. “Ma says - _said_ \- birthdays were just a way to feed our vanity. ‘Sides, I’m too old for birthdays. If you don’t know anything else, then I should go.”

“You can’t just go!” Tina says. “We could help you - you can’t - if it isn’t removed, the Obscurus will kill you.”

“Maybe,” Credence says. “But it hasn’t so far. I’m still alive - and your people _did_ try to kill me, Miss Tina, so I think on the whole I’m safer as I am.”

“Newt - Mr Scamander - do you remember -”

“He only thought he could help me, Miss. And I don’t think I want to get rid of it,” he rubs the back of his neck and picks up one of the drawings. “I need to find Mr Graves first. The _real_ Mr Graves. He’ll know what to do.”

“Credence - “

“He _will._ ” He smiles at them in what he thinks is a reassuring manner, but it must come across quite deranged as Queenie grips her own mug tighter and Tina takes a step back.

“He knew it was me. You think so too, Miss. You said - I heard you,”  Credence continues. “He’ll know what to do. I just need to find him.”    

“And where is it that you think you’ll find him?” Tina says.

“I was going to start from his apartment,” Credence says. “I know where it is. He took me there - not for anything bad!” he adds quickly as the sisters exchange a worried glance. “Ma used to take it out on my back sometimes and he healed me.”

He turns away so that he doesn’t have to see their pitying looks.

“You can’t get into his apartment,” Tina says immediately. “It’s warded - it’s still a crime scene! I was part of the team that searched it yesterday.”

“But you didn’t find anything,” Queenie says. “You found _those,_ and that’s great, but nothing that tells you where he went. Why not let Credence take a look?”

Credence smiles brightly at her. “You did say I might be able to help, Miss. Maybe I’ll see something you missed.”

Tina groans. “This is ridiculous. I’m not even considering this. Absolutely not.”

“I’ll make you some more coffee before you go,” Queenie says encouragingly, “And we really ought to do something about your hair Credence, honey. You stick out like a sore thumb.”

 

* * *

 

Credence’s first wizarding hair cut, should have been extra-ordinary in normal circumstances, but after everything that’s happened to him, it feel rather tame.

Queenie does something to make his hair grow - once it’s past his chin she waves her wand to cut it into a different style. He still has a fringe but it’s much longer, he has to sweep it to the side to keep it out of his ears. His hair curls around his ears and at the nape of his neck.

“That’s much better,” Queenie says. “Doesn’t he look handsome, Teenie.”

Tina nods without really looking at him. Queenie huffs. “Well, I think you’re very handsome,” she says and transfigures his clothing into a more fashionable suit that actually fits for once.

Tina does look at him now and blinks. “Well, that’s … I can hardly recognise him. “

“That was the point,” Queenie says smugly. “Take him in, say he’s an apprentice. No one will think twice about it.”

 

* * *

 

Credence wants to cry when they get to Mr Graves’ apartment.

There’s tape and dust everywhere. Footprints tracking over the hardwood floors that had been pristine when Credence had been here last.

Mr Graves’ files and books and many of his possessions have been boxed up, his shelves are almost bare.

The place feels ravaged, violated. Is this what happened to Mr Graves as well when the dark wizard - Grindelwald - stole his face and his life?

“Did _he_ do this?” he asks.

“Some of it,” Tina says. “But we needed to investigate everything - there’s no telling what Grindelwald may have learnt, or what he might have left behind.”

“Mr Graves won’t like it,” Credence says. “He made me take off my shoes before I came in.”

Tina looks down at her own shoes guiltily. “I’m sure the department will arrange for it to be cleaned if - _when_ we find him.”

“He isn’t dead,” Credence insists.

He could be dead. It’s possible but Credence can’t think about that right now or he’s going to slip - he’s going to lose control over his Obscurus and he needs to be in control.   

Mr Graves _can’t_ be dead. It isn’t _fair._ Not now that Credence knows that he loves him too. He must do, mustn’t he? Why else would he draw Credence like that. He wouldn’t - not unless he loves him.

Tina takes his hands in hers. “You’re right,” she says. “He’s alive and we’re going to find him. Stay with me, okay Credence?”

“I’m fine,” Credence says, pulling his hands away. “I -er - I’m going to look upstairs.”

Graves’ apartment is over two levels and Credence takes the stairs two at a time. He’s stops at the door of what must be Graves’ bedroom. It’s in a similar state to the floor below, ransacked, what order there was destroyed. The drawers have been pulled out of dressers, the closet doors hang open, contents tossed onto the floor.

Had the other wizard used this room? Had he worn his clothes, slept in his bed? Credence walks in slowly, the bed has been stripped of its covers and there are deep cuts in the mattress, the stuffing pokes through.

“Aw, jeez,” Tina stands in the doorway looking in. “What a mess. What do you think he was looking for?”

Credence squats down next to a pile of clothes and other objects and gingerly pokes at it. “Grindelwald?”

“We’re not the tidiest, Credence, but we wouldn’t have done this,” Tina runs a hand over some of the mattress’ escaped stuffing. “We didn’t get up here yesterday.”

Credence pulls a suit jacket out of the pile and presses his face to it. It smells like Graves, like cigarette smoke and the scent he uses and of _him_. Had it been worn by Mr Graves last? Or was it Grindelwald wearing his skin.

Credence feels sick at the thought. He’s about to lay the jacket down again when he feels a square shape under his fingers and reaches into an inside pocket stitched into the silk lining.

It’s a little pocket book, secured closed with a navy blue ribbon. Credence pulls it open with shaking fingers.

“What’s that?” Tina asks.

“I’m not sure,” Credence squints at the pages. “It doesn’t make any sense to me.”

Tina takes it from him. “Let me see. I’ve spent all night deciphering his nonsense. I must be fluent in Graves by now.”

She frowns at the pages. “His last appointment on the day he was last seen. Uh BP small i, that’s the Blind Pig. 1:00 , GNK. 50 Dr - that’s Dragots, wizarding currency.”

She closes the little book. “Gnarlak, huh? What was he paying him for?”  

“Who’s Gnarlak?”

“He’s a goblin,” Tina says. “I think I may need to pay him a visit tonight. This is good,” she waves the pocketbook at Credence. “Not that we wouldn’t have found it without you eventually, but-you know, good work.”

Credence takes off his own jacket and replaces it with Mr Graves, pulling it tight around himself.

Tina opens her mouth like she wants to say something and then stops herself. “I’m sure he’d want you to have it,” she says with forced cheerfulness.

“I don’t know if he would, Miss Tina, but I want something of his anyway,” Credence says. “And he ain’t in a position to say no.”

“He’s got plenty of jackets,” Tina says, dismissively. “There’s probably some fresh ones n the closet. Why don’t you take one of those?”

“No!” Credence hugs his arms around himself and pulls the jacket in with its lapels. “No, this one’s fine.”

 

* * *

 

Credence slips out of the bedroom while Tina’s still looking around and finds the guest room where Mr Graves had treated his back.

It’s fared better than the bedroom and the rest of the apartment, it’s mostly intact, ignored by both Grindelwald and the team of aurors.

Mr Graves had been so kind that day. He’d even offered to let Credence stay the night.  

Credence wonders what would have happened if he’d said yes.

There’s a large four-poster bed in the centre of the room, the curtains tied back.

Credence sits down on the edge of the mattress.

“I used this room when my father was alive,” Mr Graves had said. “He bought the apartment when he started working at MACUSA, he said it didn’t make sense for him to apparate back home every night. He didn’t like bringing work _home_ , so when he had to work late he brought it here.”

He’d never spoken of his family before, Credence suspects he was trying to keep him distracted as he healed him. Credence remembers Mr Graves’ hands - Percival’s hands, if he loves him, he should get used to thinking of him as _Percival._

He’d been so gentle, the magic had felt like a whisper over his skin, like the most feather light of touches.

Credence wonders what would have happened if he’d turned around. What would he have seen? If he had turned to look at him would he have been able to tell that Percival loved him just as much as he did.

Because it _is_ love, isn’t it?

It has to be.

He gets up slowly, leaning onto one of the posts that slides away from under his hand.

“Careful with that one,” Mr Graves had said. “It’s tricky. The problem with old furniture is that it sometimes retains a little magic.”

He reaches for the bedpost again but then he hears voices. His first thought is to scatter himself into as many pieces as he can, but he controls the urge, pulls himself back together and tries to listen.

 

**Tina**

 

“Your sister said I’d find you here,” Picquery says.

Tina forces herself to face the President and not to look down the hallway to the room where Credence was.

“I wanted to see if we’d missed anything,” she replies.

Picquery raises her eyebrows like she’s impressed. “Well, I can’t say you aren’t thorough. And did you? Find anything?”

Tina hesitates for a second. “We- er - I found an appointment book. He had a meeting with Gnarlak in the Blind Pig the night he went missing.”

She hands the book over to Picquery and points out the entry. “He owed him money, or was going to bribe him or  -we should check it out.”

“Interesting,” Picquery says. “I was here to tell you, his bank records were cleared. He removed an unusual amount of money in the days before his disappearance. It wasn’t large enough to raise any alarms but Graves was a man of habit, and this was definitely unusual for him.”

“The money for Gnarlak?”

“It was more than 50 Dragots,” Picquery says. “Gnarlak was probably just a go between. You’ll go meet him tonight?”

“Yes, Ma’am,” Tina says. “Er - Madam President, why did you have to come here to tell me about Mr Graves’ accounts? I don’t mean any disrespect, but - “

“No I understand,” Picquery says. “I came to appoint you Lead Auror in this investigation.”

 _Lead Auror?_ On the Percival Graves case? For someone who was in the wand permit office a week ago this is _huge_. Tina’s first impulse is to thank Picquery for the honour but something holds her back.

“The Director’s office received a howler this morning,” Picquery says. “From his sister.”

There it is. There’s always a catch.

“Already?” Tina says.

“The family obviously have some way of getting in touch. We’ve restricted his fireplace but that hasn’t stopped them from trying to get through.”

Piquery hands her an envelope “They sent it with a damned albatros of all creatures. Listen to this.”

The envelope is a white howler, not a red one. Graves’ family can’t be too angry with him, then. They do care about him, Tina is sure of that, but then why does he shut them out?

The howler speaks with a high, girlish voice that Tina remembers from her time at Ilvermorny. Penelope Graves, society princess, holding court among her followers.

“Perci _val_ , it’s me. _Please_ don’t be dead. It’s bad enough I have to depend on you for my allowance. If I have to ask Tris for hand outs I will simply _expire._ Speaking of Tris, Mamma’s bringing him and the brats and _De-may-tah Dah-lin’ - ”_ Penelope affects a southern accent for the last two words - “Isn’t that just _ducky?_

“You want any dope or will just the hooch do? When you said forty Firewhisky did you mean bottles or cases? I don’t think forty bottles are going to get us through Christmas, not if you plan to spend it half seas over again. I’m getting forty cases.

“Any _way_ yes: our ship gets in on the twenty second - it’s the Andromache or Andromeda, something _Greek_ \- and Mamma says she’ll expect you there. She wants to see if you can still walk. And I want the Pink Bedroom this time. I’m not sleeping in the room next to Tris and Dee Dee. Have the house-elves make it ready. And get enough Giggle Water this time, would you?

“You will be there, won’t you Perce? I couldn’t handle you dying on top of everything else. _Owl me,_ you big goof!”

The howler goes silent and neatly floats down into Tina’s hands.

“Forty cases of Firewhisky?” Tina says, failing to keep the scandalised tone out of her voice.  

“Graves is partial to Ogden’s,” Picquery says.  “And the important point was that she said the twenty second. That’s how long you have. Take what you need, Ms Goldstein and _find_ him.”

“That’s eleven days from now,” Tina says.

“Make it nine,” Picquery says. “We’ll need at least a day to debrief him, and I expect he’ll need some recovery time for spell damage. I can’t imagine he was subdued easily. I’m going to write you a note and get the Treasury to issue you 200 Dragots - you’ll provide them full expenses later, of course. That should be enough to start with.”

Tina knows that Picquery intends to make her a scapegoat on this. If she can bring Graves home in time and keep up the masquerade she’ll get no thanks, she’ll simply be doing her job. But if she fails, and she probably will - they have hardly anything to go on - Picquery will try to shift all the blame to her to try and keep MACUSA stabilised.

Tina can’t say she blames her for it.

“I didn’t part on good terms with Gnarlak the last time,” she says, wearily. “Better make it 300.”

 

* * *

 

Credence materialises next to Tina as soon as Piquery leaves, making her jump.

Tina huffs. “I don’t suppose I can convince you to wait at the apartment with Queenie.”

“No,” says Credence, tucking Graves’ jacket around himself. “Are we going to see the goblin? I’ve never been to a juice joint before!”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for any mistakes. It's been a hell of a weekend. My low-key depression kicked into Turbo mode. 
> 
> Next chapter we're back with The Man with No Name.


	6. 27th November 1926

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Who are you, he thinks. What happened to you? What war did you fight in? 
> 
> And another thought unbidden _why did you come back?_

**27th November 1926**

 

He drifts in and out of consciousness.

It’s like drowning. He tries to swim up, and break through to the surface, but he’s continually dragged back under. 

He doesn’t know what they’ve given him, only that they gave him a lot of it. He’s vaguely aware that No-Maj medicine won’t work as well on him.

What’s a No-Maj?

And if _they_ are No-Majs, what does that make him? A Maj? What the hell is a Maj supposed to be?  

What is he supposed to be? _Who_ is he supposed to be?

He’s aware of movement close by him, someone tugs on the tube attached to his wrist, feels his pulse. Perhaps the Matron, but it doesn’t feel like her. These hands are larger, warmer, _familiar_. He knows this touch - these hands.

His eyelids are so heavy, so weighted down, but he forces them open a crack. It doesn’t help much, all he can see is a blur of colour and brightness.

There are hands on his forehead now, a soft hush of breath ghosts over his face. “ _Mercy,_ Percy, wouldya look at you.”

He knows that voice. _He knows that voice._  

He struggles to sit up, to move, to open his eyes, anything.

All he sees is a flash of white hair - before the man grunts with surprise and clamps his hand over his eyes. 

Is it him? The man calling himself Gresham? But it doesn’t feel like him. Even the thought of Gresham touching him made his skin crawl, but these hands belong to someone he knows. Someone that he feels like he can trust.

“Shhh, it’s okay,” the voice is calm, unfazed by his feeble struggles. “You’re okay.”

A vial is forced between his lips, a sticky, sickly sweet liquid poured down his throat. He gags, chokes on it, but the hands holding him are firm and relentless and he can’t help swallowing most of it.

The world is spinning, spiralling. The hands are no longer forcing his eyes closed, but he can’t see. There’s only blackness, only darkness and then -

Nothing.

 

* * *

 

“Get up.” 

The girl has a supremely unimpressed expression on her face.

He blinks up at her.  “Who are you?”

“Who am _I?,”_ she glares at him. “I ought to thump you for that.”

“I don’t even know who _I_ am,” he says.

“So what else is new?” she huffs. “Come on, get up. I ain’t got all day.”

As he sits up, he sees the ward is deserted. It’s just him and the girl, everyone else, patients, nurses, orderlies are all gone.

It’s dark outside and in. A single candle hovering by his bedside provides some light. 

She’s beautiful. She has black hair twisted into a messy knot on the top of her head held in place with a long, tapered stick. Her eyes are a dark blue, so deep that a man could drown in them. He has a feeling that he did, once in another life.

She wears a white shirt over suit trousers like a man, suspenders holding them up. Her shoes, in contrast, are entirely feminine. Laced ankle boots with pointed heels.

There’s an ugly scar across her neck, as if her throat has been cut. It’s a red, angry line, crusted over with gore.

“I know you,” he says. “Don’t I?”

“Not in the slightest,” she says irritably. “Will you come?”

She takes him by the hand and drags him after her.

“You’re an idiot,” she tells him. “You make me so mad sometimes.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, contrite. He doesn’t know what it is he’s done, but he knows he would spend his entire life trying to make it up to her.

“Don’t do that,” She says through gritted teeth. “I don’t have time for your guilt. It wasn’t your fault, you hear me?”

“Then whose fault was it?”

She stops and turns to look at him. The scar on her neck starts to bleed, fresh blood seeping through the scabs. She touches it and winces.

“Damn,” she says. “We’ve no time, come on. Hurry.”

She drags him through a green door that looks like a cupboard but it’s a way to the outside. “Remember this,” she hisses at him. “Whatever else you forget, I need you to remember now.”

“Are you alright?”

“No, I’m not. I’m as far from alright as I can be, but I’ll be even less so if you don’t shut up and pay attention.”

She leads him across the road to some woodland. “Stick to the path, and you’ll be caught,” she says. “But keep the rising sun to your back and you’ll come to the cliffs, okay? This is important, the woods are thicker than they look. Don’t travel by night and don’t lose your way.”

“Aren’t you coming with me?” he says. Her neck is bleeding freely now, staining her white shirt red.

“I can’t stay,” she whispers, and she seems so desperately sad that he reaches for her, but she steps away from him.

“I lost my ring,” she says and she’s crying, tears roll down her cheeks, and mix with blood coursing down her throat.

“Maybe I could help you look for it,” he says. He begins to weep himself, though he hardly know why.

She stumbles and he moves to catch her on instinct. This time she lets him. Her head lolls backward, exposing the vicious, gaping cut in her neck. Her blood is cold like ice. Isn’t blood supposed to be warm? It chills him to the bone.

“Who did this to you?” he asks. “How can I help you?”

“Wrong question, G,” she says. “Listen,” She clutches at his arms with blood soaked fingers, drags herself up so her face is close to him.

“Sometimes, you fall,” she whispers. “And sometimes you’re pushed. But sometimes, it’s better to jump.”

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I don’t understand.”

“You will,” she sighs. She leans her head against his chest. “Do you remember - ”

She stills and falls silent and he’s shaking as he lifts her head. Her vivid eyes are flat and glassy, staring at nothing.

He lets her go in shock and she drops to the ground lifelessly.

He screams.

 

* * *

 

“Now then, now then,” the matron shakes him awake. “No call for carrying on like that, not on a morning this lovely. “

The sun is streaming through the windows, the light blinding him, he screws up his eyes and lifts his hand to shield them - his right hand.

The cast is gone. So is the pain, he flexes his wrist experimentally, makes a fist, stretches out his fingers.

He sits up and probes at his chest, feeling for any soreness from his cracked and bruised ribs, but nothing.

He can see out of both his eyes, his throat does still feel sore, but not from the rough treatment it had endured some nights ago. It’s because he had been screaming from the bad dreams.

What _were_ the bad dreams?

“What is it that gave you such a fright, hmm?” The Matron says. She fluffs his pillows up, settles the blanket he’d kicked to the floor around his waist.

He doesn’t remember. He has vague recollections of darkness, of white hair, of blue eyes, of blood but nothing concrete.

“I can’t recall,’” he says.

“Dreams are like that,” she says. There’s a vacant look in her eyes. She doesn’t seem to have noticed that his injuries are gone.

“When did they take my cast off?” he tries.

“Oh, I don’t know dear,” she says absently. “You’d have to ask the night shift.“

There’s something wrong with her. She’s like how the doctor was yesterday after Gresham had bewitched him.

There’s that word again - _bewitched._ Witch. That’s - that’s ridiculous.

Isn’t it?

“Did someone heal me last night?” he says. _Tell me the truth_ he thinks, concentrating hard on the woman. If the blond haired man could do, perhap he could as well.

“Oh, I don’t know, dear,” the Matron says again. “You’d have to ask the night shift.”

He sighs and sits back. This is going to get very tiresome very quickly.

He squirms as the short hospital gown rides up over his thighs. It’s backless and even if he’s under blankets he hates being so exposed.

“Did I have any other clothes when I was brought in?” he says. “Any belongings, or paperwork?”

He braces himself for another answer about how he was going to have to ask the night shift, but the Matron frowns. “Yes,” she says. “Yes, you did. We should have brought them to you when you woke up. I can’t think why we didn’t.”

“That’s okay, that’s fine,” he says quickly. “Could I have them now?”

Was it wearing off? Was she beginning to fight the enchantment, whatever it was? Or maybe it only worked for certain scenarios.

The Matron comes back with a bundle of neatly folded clothes and an brown paper envelope.

“Here’s what you had,” she says. “We had them laundered. They were quite a state when you came in. As were you.”

“Thanks,” he said. “You don’t know when that inspector’s coming back, do you?”

The blank look settles over her features again. “Oh I don’t know, dear. You - “

“Ask the night shift. Got it,” he says quickly. He’s rapidly losing patience with her, even though he knows logically it isn’t her fault.

“ - have to ask the night shift,” the Matrion finished. That’s interesting. So once she’s started, she has to finish.

Surely he ought to be afraid, and not so intensely curious. Isn’t that what a normal person would do? This woman, the doctor, who knows who else are being controlled somehow. They’re having their will eroded and instead of being disgusted he’s more concerned about how it works. How far does it extend to.

Why haven’t they done it to him?

Okay, now he’s ...not afraid. Apprehensive.

The Matron makes some vague noises about breakfast and leaves him to examine his belongings.

The clothes and shoes are well made and high quality. He’s obviously a man of some means. There are no cufflinks on the shirt, and no collar clips. He scoffs at himself for thinking such a detail is important but if he _knows_ that they are missing, then that means he hasn’t lost all of himself.   

He opens the brown envelope and tips its contents onto the mattress.

It’s an odd assortment of objects.

An eagle feather quill.

A card with an address printed on it with precise handwriting.

A five decade rosary made of onyx beads and a silver crucifix. 

A black card which, when he holds it up to the light, reveals a caricature of a blindfolded pig and an address in New York.

A round military tag on a chain. “Graves, N. P.” it says. “June 22, 1916 412103 U.S.A”

He swallows around the sudden lump in his throat. Is he N. P. Graves? Is this who he is?

He runs his fingers over the engraved letters. Who are you, he thinks. What happened to you? What war did you fight in?

And another thought unbidden _why did you come back?_

There’s one more object, a stained handkerchief wrapped around a ring. It looks like an engagement ring, three stones in the centre. It’s encrusted with grime and dirt, with something dark and thick and cloying that he thinks might be blood.

He’s going to be sick if he looks at it any longer, so he quickly wraps the ring back up again. Strange, he didn’t think he would be the type to get queasy at the sight of blood.

He draws the curtain around the bed for some privacy and dresses himself. He feels much more civilised when his ass isn’t hanging out.

He puts on the waistcoat but leaves the tie. He doesn’t want anything hanging around his neck, and it feels too much like a noose. He rolls up his shirt sleeves to the elbow. They’re going to annoy him without the cufflinks. He slips the chain with the dog-tag over his neck.

He doesn’t put on the greatcoat, not yet, but he tucks the tie and the other objects into the large pockets.

He runs the rosary beads through his fingers and frowns. He doesn’t feel like a particularly religious man, but he thinks he may have already met the devil. He clutches at the crucifix for a moment as if doing so might protect him and then he puts it away in one of the pockets.

“Deliver us from evil,” he murmurs.

The curtain is pulled aside and a young pretty nurse puts a tray over his lap. She has the same vacant look that the Matron has, and makes no comment on the fact that he’s dressed and sitting up, or that he looks remarkably healthy for someone who could barely hold his head up the day before.

“You must be hungry,” is all she says, and he really is.

The porridge is lumpy and congealing, the eggs are rubbery and the toast is dry, but he shovels it down anyway. Who knows when he’ll get the chance to eat again.

The tea is lukewarm and dishwatery he decides that he must prefer coffee.

He’s leaves the tray on the floor and is putting on his shoes when the little nurse comes back.

“Goodness,” she says. “You really were hungry.”

He nods at her and picks up the greatcoat. Didn’t there use to be a scarf with this?

“Yeah,” he says. “It was great. No, actually, it was terrible, but still, great. How do I get out of here?”

“Out of here, Sir?” the nurse says. “Oh, but you mustn’t leave.”

He sighs. “I’m fine. Really. Good as new.”

“You mustn’t leave,” she says, this time much firmer. “You aren’t allowed to.”

He looks at her warily. She’s still smiling at him benignly, but her eyes seem strangely purposeful.

He glances around the room. The other patients are watching him closely.

“Okay,” he says. “I won’t leave.” He swings his legs back onto the bed, reclines back. “See? Not leaving.”

She smiles at him, collects his tray and moves on to the next bed.

He smiles back, waits until her back has been turned for ten seconds and then he runs.

With an enraged howl, the nurse launches herself at him leaping up onto his back, wrapping her arms about his neck with surprising strength.

“ _Fuck!”_ he curses and drops to one knee. He slams his elbow into her face and when her hold slackens he flips her over his head.

The nurse snarls and is on her feet in an instant. “Get back to bed,” she says. “You aren’t allowed to leave.”

He’s broken her nose, blood drips down her lips and chin but she doesn’t seem to notice.

“I’m sorry about that,” he says wincing in sympathy. “But you started it.”

“You aren’t allowed to leave!”

Out of the corner of his eyes he can see the other patients starting to take notice. Some of them begin to stand up, despite whatever ailments or injuries they have and he really, _really_ doesn’t want to have to fight all of them.

“Come on, sweetheart,” he says to the nurse. “I’m bigger and meaner than you. You don’t want to do this."

She screams and comes at him again, but he’s ready for her this time and grabs her arm and twists it behind her. She tries to claw at him with her free hand, screeching all the while.

“I really am sorry about this,” he says. He gets her in a headlock with his other arm. He thinks if he can choke her out - he only needs a few seconds and - there’s another yell and one of the larger orderlies is rushing towards him. 

He lets go of the nurse and shoves her at the man. He takes advantage of the momentary distraction and slips around them only to be confronted by a wall of his fellow patients brandishing breakfast trays.

“Oh for fucks sake,” he says. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

The orderly disentangles himself from the nurse and tries to pull him back towards his bed, just as one of the more mobile patients runs at him with his tray.

He’s going to brain him. He’s going to hit him with that metal tray and he’s going to lose what little memories he has left.

He flings up his right arm up uselessly as the tray comes down and it _stops._ Suspended in mid air, inches from his face. The patient looks puzzled and tugs on it, but it won’t move.

His heart is beating wildly in his chest.

Did he do that?

He lifts his hand, shaking, trembling, and _pushes_ and the tray slams into the patient’s head, knocking him to the floor.

He laughs disbelievingly. “Are you seeing this?” he says to the orderly, who has stopped pulling, but still grips his wrist punishingly.

“You have to come back to bed,” the orderly says, but there’s fear in his eyes.

“No,” he says. “No, I don’t think I do.”

He clenches his hand into a fist and opens it, and as he does so, the orderly’s fingers are prised off his wrist.    

He waves his arm towards the wall and the orderly is flung into it, striking it hard. The man crumples to the floor in a heap.

He laughs again, and he sounds mad even to his own ears.

“Okay,” he says shakily, trying to calm himself down. “Okay. I don’t want to hurt any of you. But you need to get out of my way.”

They don’t - some of them seem nervous, but they’re still compelled to stop him.

“I’m sorry,” he says, which is a lie, because he isn’t sorry. He isn’t sorry at all. He needs to get out of here, and it isn’t _his_ fault, that they have been bewitched. It isn’t his fault that this is what he has to do to escape,  

It isn’t his fault.

_It’s all your fault. You should have been the one to die._

He freezes some of them - _petrificus totalis -_ the words come to his lips, from god knows which recess of his mind. It’s easier to focus with the words, but he doesn’t need them.

The rest he simply flings out of the way.

He meets the Matron and the doctor, Morton, as he leaves the ward and this time he doesn’t even hesitate. He tosses them aside as if they were insects.

Something stops him from going out the exit, pulls him down a corridor instead. Is it instinct that tells him to try the green door, or is it something else. Some half remembered warning.

Once he’s outside, he sees a large, black motor car.

Gresham. It looks like he hadn’t escaped a moment too soon.

He crosses the road quickly, slipping into the woods. He looks like a big black crow in these clothes. He’s hardly inconspicuous.

He moves through the trees, anxious to put some distance behind him, stopping when he comes to a well worn path.

He’s been here before. He’s seen this place.

He drops to the ground, among the fallen leaves and puts his head in his hands.

What manner of creature is he?

He’d known, hadn’t he? He’d always known. He knew that there was something different between himself and the others.

That there was something that had set he and Gresham or whatever he called himself apart.  

Us and Them.

The Witches and the Bewitched.

But Gresham was against him as well, so there was no _Us._ There was only him and everyone else. And he was fairly poor company. He had nothing but the clothes on his back, the random useless objects he’d been left with and his… magic?

It would have to do

Now what?

He could follow the path and see where it leads. But if he sticks to the path, he’ll be easier to track down. If he could find it so easily, then so could they.

The morning sun feels pleasant on his back, its warmth comforting in the cold winter air.

West then. It’s as good a direction as any. 

His mind made up, he rubs his hands over his face, gets to his feet and moves towards whatever fate has in store for him.

 

* * *

 

“You ought to take a look at this, Minister.”

“Good Lord!”

“We were able to question the Muggles before they were Obliviated but they were supremely unhelpful. They were all under Imperious. They hardly knew what they were saying. Only that someone wasn’t allowed to leave.”

“Are there any known wizards nearby?”

“The witch Angharad Jenkins and her Muggle husband. They’re missing - by the looks of the house a fight took place there recently. We have our people on the scene.”

“Jenkins? American, wasn’t she? Claimed asylum some five years ago.”

“Yes, Minister. You know how backward they are about Muggle relations over the pond.”

“Hmm, I remember her. She was an old war companion of their Director of Magical Security. Graves called in a few favours to get her and her young fellow safely repatriated.”

“Shall we let him know she’s missing? Professional courtesy and all that.”

“Yes, I think you’d better. And send an owl to Albus Dumbledore, while you’re at it. Witches gone missing, mass Muggle mind control. It looks like our mutual friend Grindelwald is up to his old tricks.”

  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The plot thickens... I think. 
> 
> I've been sick, and have been really busy at work and it's really hard to write in Graves' voice. 
> 
> He really didn't like hurting all those muggles, but he's a pragmatic asshole so he does what he has to do and doesn't let it bother him too much. 
> 
> I hope this chapter doesn't suck too much. 
> 
> Next time, we go back in time a few months for some "character development".


	7. September, 1926

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Even with a notice-me-not charm, I wasn’t about to have you strip in the street like a common whore,” Mr Graves says as he unlocks the door to his apartment. “I’d prefer to undress you in private like a more sophisticated class of escort."

 

**Three Months Earlier**

 

“Even with a notice-me-not charm, I wasn’t about to have you strip in the street like a common whore,” Mr Graves says as he unlocks the door to his apartment. “I’d prefer to undress you in private like a more sophisticated class of escort. I’m joking - ” he adds quickly. “Don’t get mad, okay?”

Credence doesn’t have it in him to be angry. He’s in pain, and he feels so sick and ashamed. Mr Graves trying to be nice just brings tears to his eyes. He blinks them away, hoping that Mr Graves doesn’t notice.

Mr Graves clears his throat and Credence glances up at him. “You don’t mind taking your shoes off, do you?” He’s very pointedly not looking at Credence’s shoes. “I - uh - just had the floors waxed and -”

“I understand,” Credence says quietly. His shoes are filthy, caked in mud and the filth of the streets and he tries, he does try so hard, to be presentable, but hours of walking through the city streets in all weather takes it out on them.

Credence toes his shoes off before he crosses over the threshold. And then bends and pulls off his socks as well, not caring that the movement is opening up the cuts in his back.

They’re threadbare, with holes in the toes and heels and damp from the wet his shoes fail to keep out. He catches Mr Graves looking out of the corner of his eye, even though the man is pretending to study his pocket watch intently.

He hates being poor, he thinks as he straightens up again with some difficulty.

He hates it even more when Mr Graves ushers him inside. It’s easily the nicest place Credence has ever been in. The living area alone is larger than the entirety of Credence’s house.  

“I’m sorry about the mess,” Mr Graves says, and Credence can only gape at him. “I wasn’t expecting company.”

He must mean the files scattered around. Perhaps they make the place look untidy but it’s far from a mess.

“Put those on,” Mr Graves nudges a pair of slippers towards Credence with the tip of his shoe. “I don’t think your feet are any bigger than mine.”

“Oh, I couldn’t,” Credence protests half heartedly. The floor is cold, and he would be glad for any sort of warmth.  

“Sure, you can.” Mr Graves toes off his own shoes and drapes his coat and scarf over a chair. He heads straight to a drinks table and pours himself a glass of a deep amber liquid. He takes a deep swallow and sighs with contentment.

“Drink?” he says.

“No!” Credence says. “I mean, no thank you. That ain’t lawful, is it?”

“That sentence wasn’t lawful,” Mr Graves mutters and finishes the rest of his drink. He pours himself another. “And it may be _illegal_ for No-Majs, but Wizards have our own rules. Put the slippers on, Credence.”

Credence blushes under the man’s gaze as he puts on the slippers, and even harder at the thought that these were _Mr Graves’_ slippers. Surely his feet shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near them, but they are warm, and soft and comfortable and _why_ is Mr Graves being so nice?

“Better?” Mr Graves asks, his lips curl in a smirk. “Sit down for a moment.”

Credence sits down tentatively on the edge of a black, leather couch and Mr Graves comes to join him. He brings two glasses of the amber liquor with him and offers Credence the second.

“I couldn’t - “

“It’s going to get very tiresome if you’re going to keep doing that,” Mr Graves leans back against the cushions. “Why don’t we just assume that you’ve protested, I have taken notice of said protest but insisted anyway and after some light persuasion you do what I asked you to do. It’ll make the whole process much quicker.”

Credence hunches away from him. “I don’t want it.”

Mr Graves leans into him, nudges Credence’s arm with his own. “It’ll help. For your back.”

“Oh.” Credence turns towards him, and the Lord help him, Mr Graves is so close, barely inches away. Close enough to kiss. He feels guilty even at the thought.

Mr Graves pushes the glass against Credence’s lips, and Credence, caught under the intense stare of his eyes, can do nothing but obediently open his mouth and swallow.

Mr Graves barely feeds him a sip, but it burns going down and Credence splutters and coughs. “Easy,” Mr Graves deposits both glasses on the coffee table in front of them and absent-mindedly pats Credence on the back.

Credence yelps and flinches away from him.

“ _Shit!_ Sorry! I’m sorry, did I hurt you?”

“No,” Credence says. “I mean, I know you didn’t mean to.”

“Shit!” Mr Graves says again. He reaches for Credence, stops and then carefully places a hand on the curve of Credence’s neck and shoulder. “This okay?”

Credence nods, he leans his face against Mr Graves’ hand, pushes into it like he’s some sort of affection starved pet, and really, that _is_ what he is, isn’t it? Mr Graves cups Credence’s cheek, and slides his hand gently over Credence’s face, his fingers linger over Credence’s mouth.

“Take another sip,” he says softly to Credence. “It will help, I swear.”

Credence does as he’s told. The drink goes down easier on the second try, so he takes a third sip and a fourth.

Is it the drink that’s making him feel hot and light-headed? Or is it just Mr Graves and the way he touches him?

“It’s called Firewhisky,” Mr Graves says. He watches Credence intently. “How does it feel?”

“Okay,” Credence says. “Firewhisky? Is that why it burns when I swallow it?.”

“More or less,” Mr Graves says. “But it passes, yes? The burn?”

Credence nods. “It’s not a bad feeling.”

Mr Graves raises his eyebrows. “Good,” he says. “That’s interesting.”

“Why is it interesting?”

“Because, my boy, if you were completely No-Maj, you should have been screaming that your throat was on fire right about now.”

Credence stares at him with his mouth wide.

“What?”

“We might make a wizard out of you yet,” Mr Graves says. His smirk is back and Credence doesn’t know if he wants to slap or kiss it off him.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Mr Graves cups his face again, stroking his thumb over Credence’s cheekbone, and Credence decides that it’s the latter, he definitely would prefer to kiss him. “I wouldn’t have let you drink any if I thought there was a chance it could hurt you.”

“I know,” Credence says, and flickers his eyes downward. “You could have asked first,” he mutters under his breath.

“I could have,” Mr Graves agrees. “And I should have, but I didn’t. Come on, drink up. Then we’ll take a look at your back.”  

He lets go of Credence leaving him cold, and wanting. And on the verge of panic, he doesn’t want Mr Graves to see his back. He doesn’t want him to see what his mother has done to him. What he’s too powerless to stop.

“It’s not that bad,” he says.

“Then it won’t take long to heal,” Mr Graves says. “It was my fault anyway, wasn’t it? I was the reason you were late.”

Credence shrugs. “Sometimes I don’t think she needs a reason,” he mumbles and _why_ is he saying these things out loud. Is it the liquor? Or is it just because he wants to tell Mr Graves? He wants to unburden himself to the man. Tell him every dark thought he has. Let Mr Graves strip him bare, metaphorically and literally. He takes another swallow of the Firewhisky, almost enjoying the burn now.

“She hates me,” Credence looks up to meet Mr Graves’ eyes. “Is _this_ why? Because I’m not all No-Maj? Does she sense it on me?”

“Maybe,” Mr Graves says. “Are you sure you’ve never made anything happen without meaning to. I know I’ve asked you this before, but - “

“No,” Credence says, his eyes sting with hot, angry tears. “No, I’ve never done anything magical. I can’t do anything like you can. I can’t do anything- “

“Hey,” Mr Graves moves closer to Credence, grips his knee with a steadying hand. “ _Hey!_ Don’t get upset - look, this - what I can do, I didn’t just know how to do it, right? I had to be taught. We all do.”

“And you think I can be taught, Mr Graves? Please don’t lie to me,” Credence says. “I couldn’t bear it if it was all a lie.”

“I don’t know for sure yet,” Mr Graves admits. “If you were going to present magic, you normally would have done it a lot sooner, but you don’t react the way a No-Maj should, or even a squ- uh - a non magical child of a wizarding family.”

“I don’t understand,” Credence says.

“I think you’ve been blocking my magic,” Mr Graves says, bluntly. “Sometimes you can see me when you shouldn’t be able to. You remembered that incident with Tina when you weren’t supposed to. Maybe I got careless with my cloaking spells  and maybe the Obliviators missed you, _or_ maybe you’re using counter spells without realising it. You wanted to remember, so you did. And you want to see me, so you do.“

Credence blushes. He does want to see Mr Graves. Every moment of every day he looks for him. Could his need be so strong that he’s really be performing magic without meaning to?

“I don’t _know,_ okay?,” Mr Graves continues. “I’m trying to find out. But I think it’s possible. And if it is, then yes, you can be taught. Before I went to school, I couldn’t even do a simple summoning charm. I know. I _tried._ I _did_ set the curtains on fire, but not on purpose.”

Credence looks up at him through his eyelashes. “You set things on fire accidentally?” He wishes he had the power to to do that. He can just imagine Mary Lou’s face if he did that the next time she demanded he hand over his belt for his own humiliation.

He knows he shouldn’t hate his mother this way. Even if she’s wrong about witches, even if she’s wrong to punish him this way, she still took him in, didn’t she? She at least tried to love him. Perhaps it’s just his own fault for being how he is.   

Mr Graves rubs Credence’s knee. “Sure. And we - _I_ \- did a lot worse than that, but you know it’s not your fault, right? Whatever you are, or whatever you’ve done. That doesn’t make it okay for her to beat you. My mother might have smacked us round the head every now and then, but she never beat us. Not even when we, quite frankly, would have deserved it.”

“Not even when you set the curtains on fire?”

“Not even then. She told me she’d always hated those curtains,”  Mr Graves smiles fondly at the memory. It softens his face, takes years off it, and Credence has the urge to reach out and touch him, the way Mr Graves touches him.

He wishes he had the courage. He finishes the rest of his drink with a single swallow and _god_ it burns. He coughs it all straight back up, choking on it.

Mr Graves’ face twists in a grimace. “I guess I should have warned you not to do that,” he says. He pulls out a handkerchief and wipes the side of his face that Credence has sprayed Firewhisky all over.

“I’m sorry,” Credence says miserably. “I’m such a  - a - “

“An abomination,” My Graves says. “That’s what you are.” But he smiles at Credence and despite himself, Credence finds himself smiling back shyly. Mr Graves wipes the remnants of the Firewhisky off Credence’s face and neck with the handkerchief and pinches the tip of his nose.

“Come on, you goober,” he says. “I did threaten to undress you.”   

“Did you just call - “

“You a goober? No, of course not. I’m a very distinguished man. If I go around calling every goober I meet a goober to his face, where would I be?” He takes Credence by the hands and hauls him off the couch.

“You’re teasing me, Mr Graves.”

“You like it. See?” Mr Graves brushes his thumb against the corner of Credence’s mouth, upturned in a smile.

Credence wants to throw his arms around Mr Graves’ neck and cling to him. He wants to hide his face in Mr Graves’ chest and shoulder, he wants Mr Graves to hold him so he can just breathe the other man in. He wants to fall at his feet and offer up everything, anything, as long as Mr Graves would only promise to never leave him.

Mr Graves looks unsure of himself suddenly and he turns away from Credence. He takes his shoulders firmly and turns him around to steer Credence towards the staircase.

“I wish you wouldn’t look at me like that,” Mr Graves says quietly, as he follows behind Credence.

Credence feels a lump in his throat. Of course, _of course,_ Mr Graves doesn’t feel the way Credence does. He only wants to help Credence out of the goodness of his heart, he isn’t a degenerate, lustful, twisted creature like Credence is, full of sinful desires and unnatural thoughts.

“Like a goober?” he whispers.

And Mr Graves laughs softly, and lightly strokes his fingers over the back of Credence’s neck as they reach the top of the stairs. “Abominable boy. What am I to do with you? I’m not doing this in _my_ bedroom, that’s beyond inappropriate. That way - second door to the left. Go in, take your shirt off. I’ll be there shortly.”   

The bedroom Credence finds himself in puts his own tiny bedroom to shame. There’s a large four poster bed in the center, that could fit an entire family. The bed is neatly made with a sky blue comforter on top. Credence catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror over the dresser and he looks absolutely frightful. He doesn’t know how Mr Graves can bear to touch him.

He runs a hand over the cord that ties back the navy blue bed curtains that match the ones in the window and wonders if these were the sort that Mr Graves had set on fire as a child.

He means to touch the burnished wood of the left bedpost at the foot of the bed, but it ripples and _slips_ away from him and Credence squawks in surprise and over-balances, falling straight onto the mattress.

“You have to be careful with that one,” Mr Graves is stood at the door watching him. “It’s tricky. The problem with old furniture is that it sometimes retains a little magic.”

Mr Graves has removed his own tie and waistcoat and stands in only his shirt, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and suit trousers. The sight of him this casual makes Credence’s mouth go dry. Mr Graves walks over to sit down on the bed next to Credence. He taps his wand to his mouth thoughtfully.   

“Let’s see the damage,” he says.

Credence flushes red with embarrassment and shame as he fumbles with his jacket and tie. His fingers shake as he undoes his waistcoat buttons. He doesn’t want Mr Graves to see.

His shirt sticks to his back, matted with dried blood and sweat. He had forgone wearing an undershirt today, knowing from experience that it would too painful to pull off over his head by the end of the day.

He can’t help a whimper escaping as he opens the shirt over his pale, skinny chest and tries to remove it.

“Let me,” Mr Graves says, he murmurs a charm - they’re always in a language Credence can’t understand, he thinks it could be latin - and a cool, soothing sensation flows over Credence’s abused back.   

Mr Graves sucks in a breath as he peels Credence’s shirt off.

“Aw, _kid!_ ” he says, and the pity stings more than his welts.

“I’ve had worse,” he says tartly, and Mr Graves lets out an angry “ _Hah!”_

“That’s not okay,” he says. “Jesus, this isn’t okay - it’s - “ his fingers skim over Credence’s skin and he shudders as he feels his skin begin to stitch itself back together under Mr Graves’ hands.

“Shhh,” Mr Graves hushes him gently. “Hold still. I know it hurts. Hold on a while longer for me, okay?”

Credence nods, because he can’t speak. If he tries, he just knows that he’s going to start wailing like a five year old.

It doesn’t hurt. Not really. Mr Graves’ hands ghost across his skin, barely touching him. The magic feels like a whisper. Has he always been this gentle? He’s done this for Credence’s hands before but that didn’t feel like _this._ Perhaps he’s being extra careful with him today. And for a moment, Credence forgets his terrible shame and doesn’t cares if Mr Graves pities him as long as he keeps touching him.  

“This used to be my room,” Mr Graves says. There’s a forced tone to his voice as he concentrates. “I used it when my Father was alive. He bought the apartment over fifty years ago when he started working at MACUSA, he said it didn’t make sense for him to Disapparate back and forth from home every night. He didn’t like bringing work home, so when he had to work late he brought it here. When we started working in the city, he said that we had a perfectly serviceable apartment here so we may as well use it. God, I would have been younger than you when I started my Auror training. It seems unbelievable that we were ever that young.”

“You keep saying ‘we’,” Credence says, lulled by Mr Graves’ voice and his gentle hands.

Mr Graves exhales slowly, as if he’s in pain. “So I do,” he says, and then adds firmly: “I might tell you someday, but not now.”

“I didn’t mean to pry,” Credence says, chastened.

“Sure, you did,” Mr Graves says and he sounds so tired. “But it’s okay. I’m done,” he pats Credence’s bare shoulder and there’s no pain at all. “Good as new.”

“Oh,” Credence peers over his shoulder to look. “Thank you.”

Mr Graves waves a hand dismissively. “It wasn’t a problem,” he says. “Credence, do you - that is, you could always stay here. For the night, I mean. If you wanted to get away from your mother.”

Credence hangs his head. He wants to say yes, desperately so. He wants to fall into Mr Graves’ arms and beg him never to send him back to Ma and to the church, but he’s already taken up too much of this kind man’s time.

“I couldn’t,” he whispers, “but thank you.”

“If you don’t want to stay here, I could - “

“I don’t want your money!” Credence all but spits at him, startled by his own vehemence.

“No! No, of course, not,” Mr Graves says. “Come on, kid. Don’t make it sound ugly. I didn’t mean it like that. I just - if you want it, the offer’s there.”

“I know,” Credence says. “I’m sorry.”

He starts to cry silently. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles again.

“It’s okay,” Mr Graves says. “Credence, it’s _okay_.” He clasps the back of Credence’s neck and squeezes gently. “Is this okay?”

“Yes,” Credence says, and sobs into his hands. “Can we just sit here? Like this? For a little while?”

“We can,” Mr Graves says. His thumb strokes over the pulse in Credence’s neck. “For a little while.”

And so, for a little while, they do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this was _supposed_ to be a quick flashback, but it sort of took over because Credence has too many feelings, and Graves is still sort of an asshole, but he does care so much about his abominable goober. ;_;
> 
> Okay _next _time there will be plot stuff.__  
>  Picquery gets owl mail, Tina meets Grindelwald. Credence meets a Goblin and more of the secretive, shadowy goings on at the Ministry of Magic.


	8. 12th December 1926

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Ah, Tina!” Grindelwald smiles warmly when Tina enters the interrogation room. “I hoped I would see you again!”

**12th December 1926**

 

**For the Attention of the President:**

 

Exhibit 72E; Letter recovered from Director Graves’ aptt.  

Postscript marked 25th November 1926. 

 

_ Dear Percival, _

_ I trust this letter finds you well. _

_ I must admit myself very intrigued about your inquiry, and your desire for complete secrecy.  _

_ I have some reason to believe that my post is not secure, so to honour your request, I shall answer your questions simply and to the point.  _

  1. _No._
  2. _No._
  3. _Yes. And you are correct in your assumption that the war makes records hard to trace._
  4. _Yes._
  5. _Yes, quite. And you flatter me too kindly, Percival Graves._
  6. _No. Though just because I am not aware of such a thing, or that it was kept quiet, does not mean that it did not occur._



_ I have a friend who might be very interested in your line of questioning - though it may take a while to find him.  _

_ I hope you are in no pressing hurry.  _

_ As I mentioned, contact is not quite safe through the usual channels at this time, so from here on look for something more unusual.  _

_ Yours very truly, _

_ Albus _

 

* * *

 

Letter rcvd 12 Dec 1926, Office of Director of Magical Security/Head of Magical Law Enforcement

_ 28th November 1926 _

_ Dear Director Graves, _

_ It is with great regret that I must inform you about the demise of Angharad Jenkins and her Muggle husband Antonio Garcia.  _

_ Their deaths occurred after a violent struggle at their residence in Hedgecomb-on-Sea, and are being investigated as a homicide. Our preliminary investigations show every indication that the murders were carried out by person(s) from the wizarding community.  _

_ Some letters were found among her possessions which suggest that you had been in correspondence for some time prior to her death. As this is an open investigation I cannot divulge any more information at this time, but I would be grateful if you and I could arrange to speak on this regard at your earliest possible convenience.  _

_ It is my understanding that Ms Jenkins was not only a former colleague of yours, but also a personal friend. Allow me to express sincere condolences for your loss.  _

_ Respectfully yours, _

_ Amadeus Scott _

_ Head of Auror Office  _

_ of Great Britain and Northern Ireland _

_ PS: If it’s any consolation, she fought bravely.  _

 

* * *

 

Transcription of White Howler rcvd 12 Dec 1926; Director Graves’ aptt. Postscript marked 29th November 1926. 

_ I don’t know when you’re going to get this letter because everything's chaos around here, but Merlin’s beard, Percy, you’ll want to be sitting down for this! Angharad Jenkins is dead! _

_ I only found out an hour ago and I had to tell you even though it breaks all sorts of protocol.  My squad got hauled into the ministry - they think it’s Grindelwald! What’s the wizarding world coming to? Poor Jay-Jay! Gosh, there are hardly any of us left any more and it’s -  _

clears throat; deep sigh

_ I’m dreadfully sorry, old chap. I really am. More as and when I can, but must dash.  _

_ Yours as ever,  _

_ Theo  _

 

**Tina**

 

“Barred?” Queenie says. “What do you mean you’ve been barred?”

“What I said,” Tina says wearily. “Gnarlak wouldn’t let us in. He’s still sore about that bowtruckle - and ‘cause your No-Maj punched him in the face.”

“His name is  _ Jacob,”  _ Queenie snaps, and even though Tina can’t read her mind, the hurt coming off her sister is an almost palpable thing.

“I’m sorry, Queenie,” Tina says, reaching out to rub Queenie’s arm. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it -” 

“I know,” Queenie says, slightly mollified. “I know you’re just tired. Gosh, Teen, you gotta get some sleep. You’ve been running on coffee fumes for forty eight hours.”

Tina nods. She’s so tired she can hardly see straight. It’s already past midnight and she has to be up early with her wits about her. 

She glances towards Credence, who’s curled up in a ball on the couch, Mr Graves’ jacket pulled up over his head. He’d refused their offer of a bed, or Queenie’s cocoa. 

Queenie follows her gaze. “I think he’s asleep,” she says softly. “The buzzing’s gone.” 

“There was a moment I thought he might lose it,” Tina confesses in a whisper. “When they wouldn’t let us in. There was this look that came over his face - he was so angry.”

“But he didn’t, right?” 

“No, I told him I’d come back with a warrant or we’d raid the place and I think I talked him down but I don’t know, Queenie. It felt close.” 

Queenie squeaks and shakes her head. She pulls Tina into her bedroom and closes the door. “You  _ can’t  _ take him in,” she hisses. “He might really go ape then. Could any prison even hold him?” 

“Probably not,” Tina admits. “But if that thing isn’t removed, it’s going to kill him. It  _ is  _ killing him.” 

“Maybe you should write to Newt,” Queenie says. “He said he could help. It can’t hurt.” 

“What would I tell him? I can’t tell him Credence is alive… if MACUSA gets word -  There’s some sort of rumour going round that Grindelwald’s army has been targeting post coming out of and into Europe. Birds are being confunded -” 

Queenie scowls. “What are you trying to hide, Teen?” 

“Stop peeking,” Tina says, but gives in too easily. She’s just so tired. “Picquery sent a pigeon - I’ve been cleared to start interviewing Grindelwald tomorrow.”

Queenie’s eyes go so wide they almost pop out of her head. “No!” 

Tina nods and massages her temples. “Yes. They tried Veritaserum but he’s built up an immunity. And he just laughed when they tried Legilimency on him. So it’s got to be done the old fashioned way.” 

“But you’re terrible at interrogation,” Queenie says doubtfully. “It was your lowest score.” 

“I know,” Tina mutters, “but Picquery’s chosen me for lead on this anyway.”

“You will be careful, won’t you?” Queenie says. “That night, in the subway -I only got a flash of it, but I’ve never met anyone that confident of themselves. His mind was like a - he was so sure that he was in the right.”

“He’s locked up, Queenie,” Tina says. “He’s in chains. He can’t hurt me.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Queenie says, a distant look in her eye. “When he said we wouldn’t be able to hold him for long, he really believed it.”

 

* * *

Tina’s not entirely surprised when she walks into the living room the next morning and sees that Credence is gone.

She’s even a little bit relieved because she didn’t know what she was going to do with him while she went to the Woolworth Building to interview Grindelwald. 

Grindelwald can’t find out that Credence is still alive. And Credence can’t be allowed to see Grindelwald either.  

Credence might have gained some measure of control over his Obscurus, but he’s clearly unstable. Even if she’s able to get word to Newt somehow, Credence isn’t about to give up his power until they’ve found Graves. The boy is single-mindedly consumed with his need to see Graves again.  

Mercy knows what will happen if Graves is not to be found. If Graves is dead, she isn’t sure that anything will be capable of stopping Credence should he lose control.  

What has Graves gotten them all into?  

 

* * *

“Ah, Tina!” Grindelwald smiles warmly when Tina enters the interrogation room. “I hoped I would see you again!”

She’s caught off guard by his seemingly genuine display of friendliness, and fumbles with her chair as she pulls it out to sit down. It strikes against the desk with a loud clang.

Grindelwald looks less put together than when she last saw him. He’s been stripped of Graves’ clothes and is clad in the drab, grey prison clothing. He has a week’s worth of a sparse, patchy beard growing, but despite it all he maintains that effortless confidence that Queenie had felt before. He lounges in his chair, despite the shackles and magical restraints, beaming at her as if they were old friends.  

“It’s -uh - Auror Goldstein,” she says. 

“Oh, I hoped we might be beyond that,” he says. “We did get on well, didn’t we, in the two weeks we spent together?” 

“You mean the time you sentenced me to death?” Tina says, sharply. “Or the time you threw a car at me.” 

Grindelwald’s face falls. “It broke my heart to have to do that,” he says. “Truly. You have no idea how I wished there was another way, but you had found out too much, you see. All due to that Scamander boy and his travelling menagerie! I wanted to kill him with my bare hands for dragging you into his mess.” 

Tina grips her folder tight so that he can’t see her hands shake. 

“Would it make a difference if I said it wasn't personal?” Grindelwald says. His voice is soft and gentle.  

Tina scoffs.

“I suppose not,” he sighs. “Nevertheless, I should like to apologise. I'm not disappointed that you survived. Not in the least - it would have been an awful waste for you to die that way.”

“But you were the one who tried to kill me!” Tina splutters. “Twice!”

“Only once,” he says. “The car was merely a diversion. Any auror worth their salt should have been able to dodge that. And might I add, how pleased I am that you have regained your former position  _ Auror Goldstein.  _ I always thought you were exemplary.”

A sharp, fierce wave of pride runs through her at that. And then she’s immediately disappointed in herself that this man’s opinion should have any sway over her, but the initial feeling doesn’t go away completely. They  _ had  _ got on well when he had been impersonating Graves. She remembers how pleased she had been that the Director had started taking a renewed interest in her. How hopeful she had been that he seemed to be considering bringing her back a month early. 

“You said I was always showing up where I wasn't wanted,” she retorts, pushing the memories from her mind.  

“And so you are,” Grindelwald says. “You have a singular talent for it, but I believe it is because of this that you are exemplary,  not despite it. Would you have ever got so close if you hadn't? They were fools to demote you. Percival Graves had an absolute gem  under his nose and could not see it”

“What did you do with Percival Graves?” Tina says. She desperately needs to gain control of this interview. 

“Did he take you to bed?” Grindelwald smirks. “Is that the real reason you were shunted down to the Wand Permit Office? Or was the man really so stupid he sent you there because you hexed a few worthless muggles.” 

Tina blushes up to her ears. “What? Of course not! How - how dare you - “

“Did you want him to? I did get that impression. Tell me Tina, your charming little infatuation - did it start with Graves or was it for me?” 

“What did you do with Percival Graves?”

“I had hoped it was for me,” Grindelwald smiles at her. “Call it the fancy of an old - well,  _ older  _ man.  I’ll tell you what, Tina. If you answer my question, I'll answer yours.” 

“That isn't how it works!” Tina says, willing her face to return back to a normal colour. “This isn't a negotiation.” 

“Clearly,” Grindelwald says, rolling his eyes. “you haven’t even offered me a Veritaserum laced coffee.” 

“There's nothing to stop us from sending you where you tried to send me!” 

“Now, now, Tina. You know better than to lie to me so sloppily. There's the entire International Statute. You know as well as I you cannot execute a European citizen. In fact you only have so much time before you lose control of me all together. 

“How embarrassing will it be for your President to admit that not only have you misplaced your Director of Security, but that he was so easily replaced.  Not to speak of the inimitable Mr Graves himself!” He grins widely as if he's just made a huge joke. 

“That wasn’t funny,” Tina says peevishly. 

Grindelwald spreads the palms of his chained hands. “I'm a patient man, Tina. I have all the time in the world. Your precious Percival, now. He may not be so lucky.”

“We can make you talk,” she says.

“Can you?” he raises his eyebrows at her sardonically. “Then by all means do so. Torture is such an ugly business though, don't you think? Will you be doing it yourself, dear Tina? I wouldn't advise it. That sort of thing, it changes you fundamentally. It leaves scars on your mind and damages your soul - and I should hate for that to happen to you on my account.”

Tina flinches, not at his words, but at how sincere he sounds. As if he might truly be more concerned about her soul than his own being. 

“It's such a simple thing,” Grindelwald says softly, carefully. “An exchange if you like. I tell you something, you tell me something. I promise I shan’t ask you anything that would compromise your precious MACUSA.”

“Only myself,” she shoots back.

“Well, of course,” he smiles, and it’s so genial that for a moment she wants to smile back. She's blushing again though this time with fury. At him, at herself. At Graves for having gotten himself kidnapped. 

She stands up abruptly. “I can see you have no intention of co-operating,” she says.

“On the contrary,” Grindelwald drawls. “Nothing would give me greater pleasure. But that’s up to you.” 

“This interview is over,” Tina says. “We'll try this again later.”

“Don't leave it too long,” he calls after her as she leaves the room. “I shall miss you.” 

  
  


**Credence**

 

Credence waits until the lights under both sisters’ doors go out and then begins to pray the Rosary. 

He counts the decades off his fingers, as he often used to - Ma had never really trusted him to take his own beads out of the house - convinced he would pawn it for some sinful, wicked purpose. He wonders what she thought he would spend the money on? 

He doesn't know what he believes in anymore but the ritual is comforting, 

The words, the Hail Marys and Our Fathers and Glory Bes, so familiar he doesn't have to think about them, lull him into a peaceful, almost trancelike state. 

By the time he's finished the apartment is silent and he feels much calmer than he has since -  well, since the real Percival went away. He’s grateful for the respite even if it’s only for a few moments. 

Credence opens a window silently and slips onto the fire escape. The sky is clear, a quarter moon hangs low in the sky. 

He closes his eyes to the cool night air as the thing within him nudges and nuzzles underneath his skin. The power that should have always been his - just out of reach. 

_ You can control it, Credence.  _

Credence jumps.

 

* * *

There's a barrier surrounding Percival's apartment.

It  might have given him some trouble before, but it’s  charmed for a human and as he is now, Credence is anything but. 

The part of him that is the Obscurus  wants to level the whole building. It wants to howl and scream its displeasure at the violation, the  _ desecration  _ that has taken place here. 

These walls harboured an imposter, a traitor within them, they don’t deserve to remain standing. 

If he dies - if Percival is dead - Credence knows he will destroy them all. Grindelwald. His followers. Everyone who  _ should  _ have known Percival was gone, but didn’t - all these witches and wizards hiding like vermin in the shadows, too blind to see what was right in front of them. Credence will hunt down every last one of them and make them pay for what they've stolen from him. 

He's quite calm as he comes to this realisation. 

This isn't rage, it's resolve. 

He stitches himself back together in Percival's room. He wishes he had enough control, that he knew proper magic to put it back the way it was. 

He wishes he had been allowed to see the room as it was.

He wishes he had been brave enough to stay.

Had he stayed, and had he come back to this room that night, to stand in the doorway as he now stood, would Percival have beckoned him inside, or would he have sent him away

He thinks he knows.

_ His _ Mr Graves wouldn’t have taken advantage of Credence when he was hurting and open. He must have known that Credence would have done anything for him, had he only asked.

Credence wishes that he had been asked. 

But  _ his  _ Percival is far too good a man to ask for such things. No matter how badly he may want them. Credence is going to have to force the issue himself  _ when  _ he finds him. 

Credence rummages through the drawers until he finds the one where Percival keeps his cigarettes. He pockets a few cartons, snags a red scarf from one of the piles of clothes and leaves this wreckage of a room. 

He goes back to the second bedroom, -  _ their  _ room - they had shared something true and real there, and carefully stripes down to his underwear, folding his clothes neatly on a chair. 

He crawls between the sheets, pulling the covers over his head.

He doesn’t intend to sleep, indeed he doesn’t know if a creature like himself even needs to sleep, but Percival had always said that he could use this bed, should he need it. And tonight he needs it. He finds comfort in the thought that this is the same place that Percival used to sleep when he was Credence’s age. 

And he finds that sleep does come to creatures like him after all.    
  


* * *

The Speakeasy doesn’t look as half as secretive or as ominous in the light of day as it had the night before.

Credence bangs on the door of the Blind Pig until he hears grumbling within. 

“We’re closed!”

“Where’s Gnarlak?” Credence shouts. “I need to speak to him.”

The window in the door slides open and a jaundiced pair of eyes squints at him.

“Oh yeah? Who’s asking?”  

“Noone in particular,” Credence says. He hasn’t really thought about what he’s going to say. “Is he there?”

“Come back at night, would ya? It’s too early for business.”

“It isn’t that early,” Credence says. “And I’ve seen people coming in and out. Seems like it's a fine time to do business to me.”

“Maybe you ain’t hearing me, kid,” the doorman says. “Get lost.” He tries to close the hatch but Credence slams his hand against it holding it open. 

“This won’t take long,” he says. “I only have a few questions - “

“Questions? Who’re you? The fuzz?”  The doorman’s eyes narrow as he regards Credence with suspicion. “Hey, ain’t you the kid that was here with that Goldstein broad last night?”

“She isn’t with me,” Credence says. “And I’m not an auror. I just want to - “

The doorman pokes his wand through the hatch, pointing it between Credence’s eyes. “Back off! Keep your hands where I can see ‘em.” 

Credence slowly backs away, raising his hands in the air.

“Now, beat it!” the doorman spits, and the window bangs shut. 

Credence exhales and tucks the red scarf securely around his neck. He’s always liked Percival’s scarfs and how they were often the one brightly coloured item of clothing he would wear among his black and white suits. 

He crosses his arms over his chest. “Fine,” he huffs, “we’ll do it your way.”

He reaches out with his power, his  _ magic  _ and rips the metal door off its hinges. 

Credence steps through the new doorway he’s made and effortlessly, without ever having to lift a finger smashes the doorman’s head against one of the low tables and pins him to the floor. 

“Where is Gnarlak?” he says, calmly. 

“Go fuck yourself!” the man wheezes through broken teeth. 

“I asked you a question and - don’t!” He turns to face the pair of short, ugly, bald-headed creatures that are trying to sneak up on him. “I don’t want any trouble. I want to speak to Gnarlak, that’s all.”

He pushes down on the doorman’s throat, watching the man curiously as he struggles to breathe. “Just tell me where the goblin is and no one needs to get hurt.” 

“What the hell did you do to my door?”

Credence lets the doorman up as a new creature approaches from behind the bar. It’s bigger than the other two, big eared and pointy nosed. 

“Are you Gnarlak?”

The goblin looks at him with beady eyes. “What sort of questions you got?” The doorman scrambles over to his boss and hisses urgently in his ear.  

“Percival Graves,” Credence says. “He came here two weeks ago, and paid you for something. I want to know what and why?”

“What’s it to ya?” Gnarlak counters. “Who are you anyway? Internal affairs? He’s your domes, innee? Why not ask him?”

“Domes?”

“Director Of Magical Security,” Gnarlak speaks slowly, deliberately enunciating every word. “You ain’t the fuzz.”

“I didn’t say I was,” Credence says. His irritation is growing. “And you haven’t answered my question.”

“You haven’t answered mine,” Gnarlak says. “Graves paid me extra to be discreet about his goings on - what’s it worth it to you?” 

“I don’t know,” Credence says. “How much is this place worth?”

“What?”

Credence  _ pulls  _ and rips off half the panelling on the bar. 

Gnarlak squawks. “Stop that! What are you doing?” 

“It won’t take me more than a minute to bring this place down,” Credence says. “Less maybe. Quicker than you can call for backup. You’re wasting my time.”

“What’s Percival Graves got to do with you?”

Credence sighs and unscrews the chandelier, flinching as the beautiful thing smashes to pieces as it hits the ground. 

The doorman and the two little bar creatures make a hasty retreat through the hole in the wall, Gnarlak tries to do the same, but Credence tugs at his short legs, tripping him up. 

“I’m only going to ask you this once more,” Credence says. He presses down on the goblin, trapping him among the shards of the broken chandelier  - it’s becoming more of an effort now, he feels hot and shaky. “Where is Percival Graves,” he whispers. “Why did he pay you?”

“I don’t know where he is!” Gnarlak chokes out. The glass shards are digging into his flesh, cutting him. “I don’t know where he went - he wanted a long distance portkey. One that was unregistered - one outside the law, right? All I did was give him a name and address. Please - that’s all I know.”

Credence lets him up. He’s sweating from the effort of keeping himself together and he mops his forehead and upper lip with one of Percival’s handkerchiefs, something else that he’d borrowed that morning. 

The goblin’s eyes focus on the monogram. “You his son or something?”

“Something,” Credence says. “I’m going to need that name.”   
  


**Tina**

 

“That was fast,” Ruby Larsson says when Tina returns to the bullpen of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. “Don’t tell us you’ve given up already?”

“‘Course not,” says Tina. “I just wanted to feel him out. Let him wait, you know. He can sweat it out a little.”

“Uh huh.” Ruby says unconvinced. “Well, better you than me. I’d say welcome back, but everyone knows that this is …” she trails off as she sees Picquery approaching. “I’m gonna get coffee from the good place, Tina. I’ll grab you a cup to go!”

“What was that about?” Picquery says to Ruby’s retreating back. “Never mind, I don’t care. With me, Goldstein.”

“How did you find Grindelwald?” she says, as Tina follows her to her office. “You were in and out very quickly.”

“He wasn’t co-operative,” Tina says, quickly. “I thought I’d let him sit there a while -um, try again after he’s had time to think.”

“He’s had six days to think,” Picquery says. “I doubt an hour or two’s break is going to make much of a difference, but this is your show. Just get him to talk.”

“Yes, Ma’am,” Tina looks at her hands. She’s so out of her depth on this, she’s almost beginning to miss the monotony of the Wand Permit Office. 

“I wanted to show you these,” Piquery says and hands her three letters. “I’m not sure what the first one is about, but Grindelwald and Albus Dumbledore are long standing rivals.  It may be useful.” 

“Angharad Jenkins?” Tina says. “Who was she?”

Picquery sighs. “She was a very talented auror,” she says. “Unfortunately she moved to Europe to be with a  _ florist  _ she had fallen in love with.” Picquery says the word florist like it's a curse. “Such a waste.”

“It’s not a coincidence that she was murdered at the same time Graves disappeared, is it?” Tina says. 

“It might be,” Picquery says. “But it’s unlikely. Especially not according to Theseus Scamander’s howler.” 

“Did she fight with them in the war?” Tina asks. She traces her fingers of the postscript of the letter from Amadeus Scott, the British Head of the Auror Office. “If it’s any consolation, she fought bravely? What sort of consolation is that?”

“A poor one,” Picquery says. “Yes they all fought in the wars together, but she and Percival knew each other before. She was his supervisor when he went through basic training.” 

“Oh,” Tina swallows. “Do you think they killed her to get to him?” 

“Almost certainly,” Picquery says. “He’s not going to take it well.” 

“I guess he already knows,” Tina says, but her heart aches for this woman, who had lived through so much only to be killed for no real reason - only because she had a small part in Grindelwald’s larger scheme. And she feels for Graves as well - to lose one of your oldest friends just so they could be used against you. “It’s awful,” she murmurs. 

“This is what these people do,” Piquery says. “Fanatics like Grindelwald and his army. They don’t give a damn about who gets in the way. They probably thought Jenkins deserved to die for being a blood traitor. You need to get him to talk, Goldstein. I don’t care how you do it.” 

“Okay,” Tina says. She takes a steadying breath. “Let Ruby get back with that coffee she promised me and I’ll go back in. I think I’m ready for him now.” 

 

* * *

 

“I liked him,” Tina says, slapping her folder on the desk of the interrogation room. “I thought he was handsome. Nothing unprofessional ever happened between us. I didn’t want to go to bed with him - not really, but sometimes I wondered what it might be like to kiss him.  _ Now,”  _ she glares at Grindelwald’s delighted face across from her. “Your turn.”   
  


**Albus**

 

Albus is troubled as he makes his way across London. The Ministry summons had been frantic and urgent, an urgency he’s come to associate with Gellert. 

Grindelwald’s so called army has been causing more havoc than is normal, but it all feels very diversionary to Albus. There’s no real point to it. The random chaos feels just that - random. Nothing but sparks and whistles to distract them from the real sleight of hand happening elsewhere. 

What is Gellert up to now? 

He’s thinking of Gellert as he used to be, all golden haired, his bright brilliant blue eyes and merry smile, and perhaps that’s why he’s not paying attention as he steps into the public toilet that leads to the Ministry. 

“ _ Obscuro!”  _

Everything goes dark before Albus’ eyes and the tip of a wand presses into the back of his neck. 

“Nicht bewegen,” the order comes harsh and guttural. 

“You’ll have to excuse me,” Albus says, congenially. “I’m afraid my German is a little rusty. I get by-”

“Ruhig sein!” the wand jabs into his neck painfully. “Das nächste Mal, wenn Sie Gellert Grindelwald sehen,  sagen Sie ihm, dass Percival Graves ihm seine Grüße ausrichtet!” 

“Percival Graves?” Albus repeats, bewildered. “What -?” 

A punishing blow to the head brings him to his knees. He gropes for his wand, blind and dizzy, but another blow comes sending him toppling over to the floor. 

His last thought is  _ Gellert  _ as the third blow knocks him unconscious.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think this may be the longest chapter I've written. 
> 
> The scene with Grindelwald and Tina was the most fun to write, even though I had to do it twice because my computer ate the first version. 
> 
> I can neither confirm nor deny that it came as a result of seeing _that_ deleted scene. 
> 
> Ah, Percy, you've created a monster and unleashed him on New York. Though maybe GrindleGraves can take some of the credit for that. 
> 
> _I don't speak German, but I can if you like. - Lady Gaga_  
>  (I'm such a dweeb) 
> 
> Next time: Credence and Queenie go to see an Illegal Portkey maker and more happy fun chats with Tina and Grindelwald  
> OR  
> Back with That American Dude lost in the Woods. 
> 
>  
> 
> ~~idk I haven't decided.~~

**Author's Note:**

> Come chat to me on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/abysmallyawesome)


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